The Thirteenth Dwarf
by maisierita
Summary: The Company comprises one wizard, one hobbit, twelve dwarves ... plus one more. Or, Bilbo joins Thorin's expedition to Erebor, and learns that not all of the dwarves' traditions are as innocuous as beard braiding and beer chugging.
1. Chapter 1

Dwarves were everywhere, underfoot, destroying his bathroom, tromping on his _furniture_. Bag-End was one of the biggest smials in Hobbiton and could easily entertain dozens of hobbits, but dwarves, though not all that much bigger than hobbits, somehow managed to take up twice as much space. Everywhere he turned, there was another dwarf touching things he oughtn't, looking places he shouldn't, and being a general nuisance. Bilbo stomped out of his dining room and into his bedroom, infuriated.

Yet the confounded dwarves had had the nerve to breach even the sanctum of his bedroom! No hobbit — not even Lobelia — would ever dare to do such a thing! But it appeared that dwarves even on their best behavior (as Gandalf claimed they were) were markedly more ill-mannered than even the most ill-mannered hobbit, and they apparently saw no discourtesy in commandeering Bilbo's personal refuge for a secret conversation. "We're but thirteen dwarves," he overheard the oldest one — Balin, he thought — saying quietly to Thorin. "And not thirteen of the best and brightest."

"Erm," Bilbo said. He would not ordinarily interrupt a private conversation – and this was clearly a private conversation — but on the other hand, it was his _bedroom_. "Hello. I'm a hobbit."

Thorin glared at him (Bilbo could already tell that Thorin spent a good portion of his day glaring) but Balin just stared at him, bemused. "Aye, laddie, so you are."

Bilbo was not accustomed to being called "laddie." On balance, he didn't think he cared for it, but that was entirely beside the point. "It's just," he said tentatively, "you said thirteen dwarves. And I'm a hobbit, you see, so that's twelve dwarves and a hobbit. Unless by signing the contract I would become an honorary dwarf." If so, he could not have said whether that would make the offer more or less attractive.

Balin eyes twinkled. "A hobbit you were born, and a hobbit you'll stay."

"Oh," Bilbo said. He blinked, coming all of a sudden to an inescapable conclusion. "You are expecting another dwarf." Though he kept his voice level, inside he was fuming. The _nerve_! As if a dozen dwarves destroying his house wasn't enough!

"The thirteenth is already here," Thorin said gruffly. "He is tending to the ponies outside."

Bilbo blinked again. "He has been here for all this time? But — he's quite missed supper!" Now he was very upset. He did not really understand what all the fuss was about lost mountains and gold and — ha! — dragons, but he understood dinner, and it was distressing to think that he had a guest — of a sort — who was outside and who had missed an entire meal while on his property, if not quite in his house.

Thorin frowned, though Bilbo suspected that perhaps it was his ordinary expression. Certainly nothing resembling a smile had yet made an appearance. "He has hard tack and jerky. You needn't concern yourself with his supper."

"Hard tack and jerky," Bilbo gasped, properly horrified. "That will never do! Not in my house!" He shuffled quickly out, bowing awkwardly because he rather assumed bowing was expected, and hurried to the small laundry alcove, where he had secreted a heaping plate of food when it had become obvious that the dwarves intended to leave no crumb from his pantry behind. The plate had survived miraculously untouched by the dwarves (perhaps because he'd taken no chances and had hidden it behind a mound of dirty towels) and Bilbo eyed it regretfully. It was hardly enough for a proper meal for one, certainly not for two, but there was no help for it. Hard tack and jerky indeed! At Bag-End! He shuddered in horror and no small amount of indignation.

Bilbo retrieved a plate from the extra set — they had been his grandmother's, but he didn't like them and only ever took them out when the Sackville-Bagginses came around — and carefully served up a generous half of the food from his own plate. After a moment's indecision, he kept the entire seedcake to himself, though he then felt so guilty about it that he placed an extra link of sausage onto the other plate to compensate.

Carefully, he crept out the back door of the house. He was, as Gandalf had noted, quite quiet when he needed to be, and anyway, it didn't seem like the dwarves were paying him the slightest bit of attention. The ponies were easy to find, tied up neatly to the fence, and there was indeed a dwarf standing next to them, carefully brushing them down.

"Good evening, Master Dwarf," Bilbo said brightly. "I've brought you some supper."

The dwarf turned, apparently startled, and stared at him for a moment, brow creased in confusion. "Supper?"

Bilbo frowned, wondering if perhaps this dwarf was a little slow. "Yes," he said carefully. "Supper. At least, what of it I could salvage. I'm afraid your brethren have eaten most of the best already, and no one thought to tell me you were here, or I would have made sure to save you some of the deviled eggs. But that's neither here nor there, really, as I'm sure you'll find this quite to your liking. The rest of your company seemed to enjoy it all well enough." And he shoved the plate of food at the thirteenth dwarf, who took hold cautiously, peering down at it.

"You're very kind," the dwarf said, depositing the plate carefully to the side, away from the horses. He was tall, with wild dark hair that held not a single braid or bead, and his beard was so short Bilbo assumed he shaved it with some regularity, which seemed odd in comparison with the somewhat elaborate facial hair the other dwarves sported. His clothing was rough and worn, though not falling apart, but still very plain and simply functional. He wore only a single dagger at his side, which was one dagger more than Bilbo had ever worn in all his life, but was considerably less weaponry than the other dwarves toted about.

The dwarf bowed low — very low, nearly in half — and said, "Kili, at your service."

"Bilbo Baggins at yours," Bilbo said, with a small neat bow of his own. He eyed the dwarf curiously. "Kili, you said. I suppose, by your name, you are kin to Fili?" He was quite proud of this deduction, having just met his very first dwarf a scant few hours earlier, but the pattern of dwarvish rhyming names indicating kinship seemed quite clear to him, even though he concluded that Kili must have lesser status than the others, else he would surely have been inside with them.

But Kili frowned just a bit and shook his head. "No. I have no kin."

"Oh," Bilbo said, frowning himself for being proved not quite so clever as he had thought. "I'm sorry, your names are so similar, I just assumed ... well, anyway, I had probably best get back indoors before they decide to use the furniture for kindling. I'll prepare a bed for you along with the others, and you can bring the plate in when you're done with the ponies."

Kili shook his head again. "No thank you, Mr. Baggins, that won't be necessary. I'll stay out here with the ponies."

"But–" Bilbo spluttered, "they will be quite safe tied up, and there is nowhere to sleep out here. I don't even have a barn." There was a small shed, of course, but it was filled with potting soil and gardening implements, and smelled dreadfully of fertilizer.

"The ground is soft," Kili said. "And it does not seem like it will rain. I have slept in many worse places." He bowed again. "I thank you again for the food."

"You are most sincerely welcome," Bilbo said with a touch of resignation, for there seemed little chance of changing Kili's mind, and Bilbo suspected it might be rude to try. He bowed again — goodness, he thought, he'd certainly done a lot of bowing today; it was almost impossible to not to, what with the dwarves doing it every other minute — and crept back into the house just in time to rescue a small snack table from becoming kindling in Bofur's grimy hands.


	2. Khazd khuv

The next day, after Bilbo had, to his own surprise, signed the contract and gone running after the dwarves, he found himself astride a pony for the very first time in his life. He rather thought he might fall off, but after a little while, it became clear that so long as he didn't twist too suddenly, the pony was quite content to leave him on its back. Soon after that, as he was beginning to get sores in many uncomfortable places, leaving him very pessimistic about the state of his bum for the rest of this journey, he found himself riding next to Fili.

Fili was young and excited to be on a quest, and he spun marvelous stories to Bilbo about all the places he'd seen. Far too many, really; Bilbo suspected deeply that Fili was making some of them up. But Bilbo was quite fond of stories, and the stories of a dwarf were very much more interesting than the stories of a hobbit, which often revolved around nothing more exciting than meals and gardens and the occasional party.

"So," Bilbo said, at a convenient break in the conversation, "might I ask a question?"

"Anything at all, Mr. Baggins."

"It's just," Bilbo said, a little uneasy, "and certainly you don't need to tell me if the topic is too sensitive, but I was curious."

Fili waited a little bit before prompting, "About what?"

"Well," Bilbo said. "It's just. Kili." He jerked his head subtly behind them. Kili was trailing at the back of all of them, riding a pony and seemingly minding all the extras, of which there were a fair number. "Is he, I don't know, a servant of some sort? It's only that he slept outside last night with the ponies, and I've not seen him to talk to anyone today."

Fili's face went blank and still for a moment before he recovered his composure. "He's not a servant. He's ... I don't know the word in Common. He's _khazd khuv_."

"Well," Bilbo said, "you may not know the word in Common, but I certainly don't know it in Dwarfish."

Fili frowned, and lowered his voice. "He's paying off a life debt."

Bilbo blinked. "A life debt? What is that?"

"It's–" Fili said helplessly, then he scowled. "It's hard to explain. He killed someone, and so he must pay off the debt."

"He killed someone!" Bilbo said, aghast. He turned around and took a furtive look at Kili. He didn't look very dangerous, but Bilbo supposed you never could tell, really, not that he had any direct experience with murderers, or dwarves for that matter, and certainly not murderous dwarves. "I don't think I shall sleep very well with a murderer in our midst."

"It was not murder," Fili said, frowning. "You are in no danger. Well, at least, you are in no danger from Kili. It was a very long time ago. He killed a dam."

Bilbo was confused. The dwarves did not seem so irrational, though they were very exuberant, and hobbits might easily confuse the two. "He is serving a sentence for killing a horse?"

Fili frowned more fiercely. "A dwarrow-dam. A female dwarf. There are very few of them among our people."

"Oh," Bilbo breathed. "How horrible. So this _khazd_ thing means that he must pay a debt for her life?"

"_Khazd khuv_," Fili said. "Aye. One year for every one he took from her. She was young, scarcely a hundred years old. His sentence is 150 years."

"One hundred fifty years!" Bilbo couldn't believe it. "He will be quite old when he has finished serving his sentence."

Fili shook his head. "He has already served more than half of it. He will be but middle-aged when it is done."

Bilbo blinked. He turned around and peered at Kili again. "But he looks like a boy. How can he have served more than half his sentence?"

"He is no boy," Fili said, apparently amused. "He is 77."

"Well," Bilbo said, astounded. "I knew that dwarves lived longer than hobbits, but never dreamt — why, he is older than I am!" Then another thought struck him, and he frowned. "But if he is 77, and he has served more than 75 years, he must have started when he was but a babe!"

"From the moment of his birth," Fili said grimly.

"Oh," Bilbo said, in a very small voice. Comprehension dawned, and it was a cold and terrible thing. He glanced back at Kili one more time, but sadly now. "The female dwarf. She died during childbirth?"

Fili nodded tersely. "Yes. Her name was Dis, daughter of Thrain."

"Daughter of Thrain — but I have heard that name. Why, she must have been–"

"Thorin's sister," Fili said flatly. "And my mother." And then he spurred his pony ahead without uttering another word.

* * *

A/N: I know some readers may find the entirely author-invented concept of _khazd khuv_ distasteful. Fair warning: it gets worse before it gets better. But not, I think, monstrously so. More on _khazd khuv_ in the next chapter.

Chapters will get longer later, I swear. Comments and concrit welcomed!


	3. Tragedy and cake!

Bilbo found himself deeply unsettled by the conversation with Fili, and would have thought the young prince (though Bilbo had since learned that Fili was 82, and young Ori was actually a full 50 years older, making him older than the oldest hobbit ever to have lived) was teasing him, except that he had been so grim in the telling of the tale. He dared not ask any of the other dwarves, for if Fili's story was true, Kili had been born into servitude for a crime that was most certainly — in Bilbo's view — not his fault, and Bilbo did not want to believe the dwarves could be so cruel. So in the evening, when the Company had settled down and Kili was once again tending to the ponies, Bilbo sauntered over to where Gandalf was smoking a pipe. He was rather pleased with himself for looking quite casual as he approached.

"What troubles you, Master Baggins?" Gandalf said, and Bilbo's face fell just a little bit at discovering he was not so clever as he thought.

Bilbo looked carefully around, but the dwarves were utterly ignoring him, and even Gandalf's attention seemed somewhat splintered, as if his smoke rings were of equal (or greater) importance. "I spoke to Fili about Kili today," he whispered.

Gandalf's face went long and sad. "A tragedy," he murmured. "One of many suffered by Durin's line."

"But," Bilbo insisted, "his mother died whilst delivering him! Surely no one could hold a babe responsible for such a thing."

Gandalf looked reproachfully at Bilbo. "Do not judge others through the lens of your own experience," he said gruffly. "Unless you are prepared to tell me that there are no customs in the Shire that others would find unpalatable."

"But there aren't," Bilbo said insistently. "Well, unless perhaps you count the Feast of the Entrails, but there is historical precedent, and no one takes it seriously anymore. Well. Hardly anyone, really. " He huffed at Gandalf's raised eyebrow. "All right, yes, I see your point, but still, a sentence of 150 years seems rather extreme for something over which he had no control!"

Bilbo said this in quite an excited tone, then glanced around nervously. Fortunately, the dwarves were all deeply involved in some sort of card game, and did not appear to have noticed his hysteria. Kili, for his part, was still tending to the ponies. As there were 16 of them, Bilbo expected the task would take most of the night.

Gandalf puffed serenely at his pipe. "The laws of _khazd khuv_ are very old, far older than any laws of hobbits. Dwarf women are sturdier than most. They very rarely die in childbirth. When one does, it is assumed that there must be some fault with the babe."

"But to set the child to a life of servitude — "

"It is not often so strictly practiced. Dwarrow children are rare and precious. Most such babes are fostered off to relatives. Had Dis not been of the royal line, Kili would likely have been sent to his cousins in the Iron Hills."

"But 150 years!"

"I understand you may think it harsh, and so it seems to me as well, but we are neither of us dwarves, and Kili has been cared for well enough," Gandalf said. "He will not have been abused. He will have been fed and protected. You see he carries a dagger, and he is quite skilled with a bow."

All of these things might well be true, but Bilbo was still uneasy. "He says he has no family."

"In the dwarvish custom, he does not. He is not considered to be Fili's brother or Thorin's nephew, and you should not refer to him as such."

"And when his sentence ends?" Bilbo asked glumly, for he found this entire situation to be very distressing. "What happens to him then?"

"He will be free to make his way in the world, on a path of his choosing. Though I fear he will always bear a stigma among the dwarves. To be birthed thus is considered terrible bad luck, and he is believed to carry it with him."

"So his family will not welcome him back?" Bilbo asked, though he was certain he already knew the answer.

"As I said," Gandalf said sadly, "_khazd khuv_ have no family."

* * *

All the dwarves were endlessly interesting to Bilbo — though Bifur and Dwalin were in truth more terrifying than interesting — but Bilbo found himself watching Kili the most. It was true that he did not seem to be mistreated, particularly, but neither did Bilbo think anyone went out of his way to treat him particularly well either. He was always on second watch — the hardest watch, in Bilbo's opinion, since it meant an interrupted night's sleep no matter what — and he always slept the farthest from the fire, a certain distance away from the other dwarves. Worse, he was always served his meals after everyone else had eaten, sometimes after they had been served twice; if that meant he got mostly broth and bits of meat and whatever else sank to the bottom of the stew, no one but Bilbo seemed bothered by it.

Worst of all, Bilbo confided to Gandalf, "No one ever talks to him."

Gandalf nodded, his eyes sad. "To be _khazd khuv_ is to be lonely."

To a gregarious hobbit, it was nearly unbearable. One day after they had been trapped in the rain, when they were all soaked to the skin and very grumpy, they took shelter for the night under a large overhanging rock, not really large enough to shelter the entire company. Kili, of course, was sent outside to mind the ponies, who were soggy, muddy messes, and who, if Bilbo was any judge of ponies (which he was not, really), were equally as grumpy as the dwarves.

The setting sun had emerged from the clouds and the air was warm; but for the damp clothing, it was a pleasant evening. Bilbo steeled his nerves and approached Thorin, dreading the conversation but unable to bear being party to Kili's exile for even one more minute.

"Thorin, sir," he said timidly, "if I might have a word?"

Thorin looked at him from under a damp fringe of hair. He looked very irritable. Of course, he always looked very irritable. "Mr. Baggins," he said, not very unkindly, "how may I help you?"

"Well," Bilbo said, "it is just, you see, I was wondering–"

Thorin waited patiently for nearly ten long seconds. "Yes?"

"Well, I understand your rules, of course, and don't wish to do anything to get anyone in trouble, but I thought–"

Thorin's period of patient waiting was shorter this time. "Yes?"

"Well. It's just." And then Bilbo took a deep breath and rushed out, "If it is not against the rules, I wondered if I might go outside and talk to Kili. Sir."

Thorin stared at him wordlessly for a moment. He did not look upset, though he was perhaps a little bemused at the request. "There is no rule against talking to him. Do as you wish." Then he seemed to lose what little interest he had ever had in the conversation, and turned to Dwalin, who was in the process of squeezing the water from his tunic, his enormous arms straining as he twisted the cloth.

Bilbo scurried outdoors before Thorin could change his mind, and found Kili sitting against the wall, scrubbing mud off his boots.

"Master Dwarf!" Bilbo cried cheerfully.

Kili looked up with a frown. When he saw no other dwarves whom Bilbo could be addressing, he blinked and looked puzzled.

Bilbo sat down next to him. "Well," he said, "today was not so much fun, was it now?"

Kili stared at him for a moment, fingers frozen over his boots. Then he said, "No," very cautiously, as if he was not convinced he should be speaking at all.

"No, it was not," Bilbo agreed heartily. "And I don't mind saying, after such a day I could use a little pick-me-up."

Kili stared some more and an extraordinary expression crossed his face, as if he was considering what he could possibly say to this strange little creature in front of him. Apparently he could not reach a satisfactory conclusion, for he turned his attention back to his boots, which were really quite spectacularly coated with mud. Bilbo's own feet had been similarly coated, but he had found a convenient puddle to wash them, and they were again clean and dry.

"It just so happens," Bilbo said, leaning in confidentially, "that I have been saving a treat all this time, waiting for just the right occasion, and I think perhaps that occasion is today." He reached gently into a pocket and pulled out a small bundle wrapped in a napkin. "A seedcake," he said. "Home-made and quite delicious, if I do say so myself, even though it is no longer quite fresh." He broke the cake carefully in half, and reached out to hold the larger half to Kili. "I would be very honored if you would share it with me."

Kili's mouth twisted and his eyes flickered to the overhang where the rest of the dwarves were. As usual, they paid him no attention whatsoever. But when Kili turned his attention back to Bilbo, his face was quite determined. "That is most gracious of you," he said, strangely stiff and formal, "but I would not take your treat away from you, Mr. Baggins."

"Now, now," Bilbo said severely, "that will not do at all. I don't know how things are among the dwarves, but we hobbits take our food very seriously indeed. I shall be gravely insulted if you do not share with me." He nodded for emphasis. "Very gravely insulted." And he held out the half of the cake again insistently.

Kili's brows knit together as he studied Bilbo's face, but there was really no way to refuse such an offer, and so he eventually bobbed his head and accepted the cake, though he did not eat it until Bilbo had already eaten his own.

Kili took a bite of the cake and blinked, looking startled.

"Is it no good?" Bilbo said nervously, even though to him it had tasted wonderful, so long did it seem since he had eaten anything of the sort at all. "It has been in my pocket for many days. I'm sorry I do not have a fresh one to share with you. They are best when fresh out of the oven."

"It's very good," Kili said immediately, finishing the rest in two quick bites. "I was just surprised. I am not often given sweets."

"I suppose you wouldn't be," Bilbo said, patting his knee, and feeling a little guilty for having kept the entire seedcake to himself that first night at Bag-End. "I'll tell you what, my lad," (which was ridiculous, really, as the lad in question was 25 years older than Bilbo), "I shall make sure to share with you any sweets we come across on this journey. What do you think of that idea?"

"I think," Kili said slowly, looking at him with a deeply puzzled but not displeased expression, "that you are nothing like a dwarf."

"Well, no," Bilbo said cheerfully. "Of course not. And quite a good thing too, I should say, or I should not have had the restraint to save the seedcake until we today, when we needed it most!"

* * *

A/N: A longer chapter for all of you! Two chapters, really, but the first was too short to post on its own. Things should start heating up from here on out.

Comments and concrit always appreciated!


	4. Fire and water

Things went on such for a number of days, and Bilbo grew used to the occasional odd look he would receive from the other dwarves when he would make time to speak with Kili, none odder than from Kili himself, who received his attentions with no little puzzlement. But none of the dwarves ever told Bilbo he could not speak with Kili, and none seemed any less happy to have him along, though they were no more happy either, especially Thorin. But as nothing ever seemed to make Thorin happy, Bilbo did not view it as any sort of personal affront.

Bilbo learned soon which lines could not be crossed, though he was largely exempt as he was not a dwarf and was considered a little peculiar besides. Speaking with Kili was acceptable if necessary but the sharing of a meal was generally not, though the necessities of life on the road made this latter rule somewhat flexible. Drawing Kili into conversation with the rest of the company was quite out of the question. Bilbo grew a little unhappy then, for he had thought perhaps he could show the other dwarves that Kili was really a pleasant young lad, and there was no need to treat him as if he had contracted some sort of horrible illness, but his one attempt to bring Kili into a discussion of dwarven summer festivals was met with stony silence on all parts. Kili for his part had shot a frantic glance at his uncle (no, not his uncle, his _shemor_, for which there was apparently no direct translation, but which Bilbo gathered meant something between _warden_ and _minder_) and had stepped back quickly to rejoin the ponies.

"It is just," Bilbo had later lamented to Gandalf, "that they almost treat him as if he is not there."

"You cannot change their customs simply because you do not like them," Gandalf had chided him, and Bilbo had had to sadly agree that it seemed unlikely he could, not when Kili himself seemed so little bothered on his own behalf. So Bilbo contented himself with doing what little he could, though it certainly felt like little enough, and he had not even so much as a single seedcake left to share when no one was looking.

But then one day it rained from morning until night, and they were all quite wet and dispirited, and could not even find any dry patch of ground to sleep on. Then they noticed that Gandalf had quite disappeared without so much as a by-your-leave, and the best they could do was to huddle miserably under a patch of trees, cold rainwater dripping down their necks, shivering from the chill. It had rained so much that all the wood was utterly soaked through, and not even the best firemaker among them could light so much as an ember.

Then one of the ponies took fright at nothing and bolted. He got into the river before they could catch him; in a flash, Fili dove in to save the pony and all the supplies he carried. But the current was fierce, and dwarves, it seemed, did not float nearly as well as hobbits, and Fili was quickly swept away before any of the other dwarves could think what to do.

Kili dove into the water a heartbeat later and between the two of them they managed to save each other and the pony too, but all the bags it carried were washed away. Fili's face was red and scratched from where he had scraped it against a rock and Kili had a large dark bruise on his ribs from where the pony had kicked him in its fright. He came out of the river coughing and choking, for the kick had knocked him fully into the water and he had stayed under for so long that Bilbo was convinced he had drowned until he came up spluttering and coughing, hanging determinedly onto the pony's bridle and shaking his hair like a dog caught in a downpour.

They were all quite disheartened at the loss of their food and Gandalf's continued absence, for it would have been very marvelous to have a wizard at hand, at least to dry their soaking clothes if not to magically make supper appear, but Gandalf was gone as if the earth had swallowed him whole, and no amount of grumbling served to make him appear again. They grew crankier still when it began to rain again, and set about squabbling over the pettiest of complaints. But then in the distance they saw a light shining, a reddish comfortable-looking light, and after no small amount of arguing they decided that they should go see what it was, for it had to be better than sitting in wet clothes with no supper all night.

But then their night proved true the old adage that misfortune keeps calamity close to heel, for it was not so very much later that the dwarves were all caught by trolls and stuffed into bags to wait while the trolls decided how best to cook them. And poor Bilbo only just barely escaped with his skin intact and spent a very miserable few hours indeed in the bushes, sore and wet and wondering how he could ever save his poor friends from a most horrible fate.

Thank goodness Gandalf heard the colossal fuss the dwarves made when they were getting stuffed into the sacks, and he very craftily tricked the trolls into such a bother that they quite forgot to pay attention to the time, and all were turned to stone the moment the sun rose. Then there rose quite a commotion as Bilbo and Gandalf freed the dwarves from their sacks, and there was much excitement until they were all satisfied that every dwarf was well and accounted for, and none really the worse for wear but Fili and Kili, who were still bruised and battered from their misadventure with the pony.

Fortunately, Bilbo found a key that one of the trolls had dropped to the ground — quite conveniently before turning to stone, for otherwise there would have been no way to prise it from the troll's fingers — and they quickly discovered the door to which the key belonged, and that led to the cave where the trolls would spend their days hiding from the dangerous light of the sun. The cave was full of treasure and weapons and most importantly, food, and their spirits were all greatly improved at the prospect of a good meal at last.

They made camp in the shadow of the stone trolls, and Fili and Ori thought it very humorous to sit upon the trolls' great stone feet as if they were thrones of gold. The fire over which they were to have been roasted had burnt down to embers, but Gloín swiftly built it into a very cheery blaze, and they all set about changing out of their stiff damp clothing so it could dry in the warmth from the flames, and ate their dinner in nothing but their smallclothes, which was very comical indeed.

It fell to Kili to retrieve the ponies, of course, but he set about it willingly enough, and Bilbo was in such fine spirits that he volunteered to help, and in due time all the ponies had been brought to the camp, and were safely tied up so they could not run away again and cause any more trouble. The dwarves were very merry and they crowded around the fire singing dwarvish songs, though Bilbo could not make much sense of them at all. Poor Kili was not quite so merry, because he had started coughing as soon as he had emerged from the river the night before and had not managed to stop yet; certainly a night spent in wet clothes while stuffed into a smelly troll sack had not helped matters any. But of course Kili would not have joined in the singing in any case, and Bilbo thought it probably did him some good just to sit near the fire and get warm again, and indeed he did seem to be enjoying the singing, for he looked quite content.

But after the singing ended, as they were beginning to think how very tired they were and how pleasant it would be to sleep the rest of the afternoon and all the night away, Thorin took a soft leather switch from his bag and came round to where Kili was sitting on the other side of the fire. Thorin pointed with his chin away from their camp and into the forest, and after just the briefest of pauses Kili nodded silently. He rose stiffly to his feet, padding softly after Thorin without even putting on his boots, and both of them were still in their smallclothes, though it was not so funny now as it had been a few moments earlier.

Bilbo stared after them, very unpleasantly surprised at this turn of events, which had put quite a damper on his merriment. "Why," he cried indignantly, "Thorin is not going to punish Kili, is he?" But obviously that was what was going to happen, for Thorin had looked very determined while Kili had just looked resigned.

None of the dwarves would answer him, though they muttered to each other and cast dark superstitious looks towards the woods.

Bilbo was quite affronted on Kili's behalf. "But surely you don't believe any of this was his fault?" It seemed quite ridiculous to Bilbo, for certainly nothing Kili had done had brought the trolls down out of the mountains, and he had not even been part of the debate to investigate the red light the night before.

The dwarves muttered among themselves again, but it was not in Common speech so Bilbo could not understand, and finally Bofur said, "Well, he's _khazd khuv_," as if that were any sort of an answer at all.

Bilbo waited but a few minutes to walk over to Bofur and confront him, for he was really very upset and could not believe the dwarves would so willfully disregard all common sense by punishing one who had done nothing wrong but nearly drown trying to retrieve a frightened pony and then get captured by trolls. "Bofur," he said, quietly so the other dwarves would not hear, "do you truly believe Kili brings bad luck?"

Bofur cocked his head and looked at him curiously. "Do you truly believe the sky is blue?"

"But," Bilbo spluttered, for it was quite absurd, "a person cannot carry bad luck with him like a pouch of pipeweed!"

"He's _khazd khuv_," Bofur said again, quite infuriatingly. "And that's why we're so grateful for you to have come along, Mr. Baggins. Can you imagine a company of thirteen, and one of them _khazd khuv_? Why, we might as well have rolled all over in spices and offered ourselves up to Smaug for his supper."

Bilbo found this utterly ridiculous, but just at that point, Thorin and Kili returned from whence they had gone. Thorin looked no more nor less happy than he had before. He put the switch away in the bag without further comment and did not speak again that whole night. Kili sat slowly back down by the fire away from the rest of the dwarves, and though he moved a little carefully, he did not seem to be in so very much more discomfort than before, though he would not lie down and fell asleep hunched over with his head pillowed on his knees.

The next morning dawned very bright, and the dwarves were in high spirits as they dressed and armed themselves with the fine blades they had retrieved from the trolls' cave. But Kili's cough had gotten worse overnight, and at midday when they stopped to eat he would not take anything but a small cup of tea, which he sipped rather miserably between fits of coughing. Bilbo spent the afternoon looking backward at him worriedly, at one point twisting around so far that he nearly fell off his pony and had to be righted by Ori, who had taken to riding next to him so they could trade stories from the Shire and the Blue Mountains.

By the time they stopped for the evening, Kili was glassy-eyed and feverish and his lips were faintly blue, which alarmed Bilbo to no end, and the other dwarves as well. Bilbo was relieved to see that, though they gave Kili very little thought in the ordinary course of things, they would at least tend to him when he fell ill.

"Pneumonia," Oín barked, having placed his ear trumpet against Kili's chest and listened for a few moments. "It was the river water that did it." Then he rummaged in his pack and mixed up a tea that smelled strongly of garlic, and they forced Kili to drink two whole cups even though he looked rather green after the first. "Right as rain in a few days," Oín predicted, which was not Bilbo's experience with pneumonia at all, but it seemed dwarves were a very sturdy sort, and recovered very quickly from all sorts of ailments which would keep a hobbit abed for weeks.

Kili would eat no dinner at all, and his cough kept the entire Company awake the whole night through, but in the morning his eyes were a little clearer and he could swallow a small piece of stale bread without looking as though he were about to be violently ill. Oín declared him on the mend, though he made him drink garlic tea all that day and the next as well for good measure.

Bilbo felt quite sorry for him, because as soon as Kili's cough eased, Thorin put him back on second watch. But Kili appeared quite unperturbed, and seemed to rather enjoy his time alone with the ponies, who certainly paid him more attention and were altogether friendlier to him than the dwarves. Bilbo resolved quite firmly that he would not fall prey to the dwarves' silly superstitions, and so he made sure every day to spend at least a few minutes in conversation with the thirteenth dwarf.

* * *

A/N: If a couple of lines look familiar, it's because I lifted them from Tolkien. Consider it an homage,.

mments and concrit always welcomed!


	5. Give and Take

After only a few days, the food they had taken from the trolls ran out, and it took very little time before they became very hungry and dispirited, especially Bombur, who was quite as fond of regular meals as any hobbit, and took to groaning piteously of hunger. After the second straight day of no breakfast, no lunch, and hardly anything for dinner, the dwarves made camp early and sat themselves around the fire, too dejected even to sing. Even Gandalf's smoke rings were gloomy, dissipating into the air without any showing off at all, having not enough energy to make a single figure eight.

At some point, after a particularly wretched round of moaning from Bombur, Kili went to tend to the ponies, who, being content to sup on grass, were in far better spirits than the dwarves. Bilbo would ordinarily have joined Kili in caring for the ponies, for Kili seemed much more willing to speak with him out of the earshot of the other dwarves, but Bilbo was tired and cranky and wanted little more than to go to sleep as soon as possible. At least asleep, he could ignore the incessant complaints from his own stomach, not to mention the considerably noisier complaints from the stomachs of the dwarves.

But the sun had still not set and no one else had so much as unbuckled their bedrolls, so Bilbo sat discontented by the fire, ruing the day he had ever left Bag-End, where there was always food for supper and dinner and he never ran low on cakes or jam. He had begun to make a list of all the reasons why leaving the Shire had been quite the worst idea he had ever had — the trolls undoubtedly placing first, though the absence of regular meals and lack of proper washrooms were battling for second — when Kili came back from the ponies and without so much as a by-your-leave came round the fire and knelt down in front of Thorin, head bowed.

Conversation ceased immediately, and the mood grew tense and a little anxious, with the other dwarves muttering uneasily amongst themselves. Gandalf remained silent, but puffed a little harder on his pipe, and his expression, from what Bilbo could see of it under the floppy rim of his hat, was grim.

Kili said nothing, but knelt motionless on the ground, and in his hand he gripped the switch from Thorin's bag.

Bilbo swallowed around a lump that had suddenly formed in his throat and waited with a horrible sinking feeling in his stomach, far more distressing than any pangs of hunger.

Thorin did not move, but regarded Kili silently, face shadowed. Then finally, he reached his hand to Kili's shoulder and said, very clearly and distinctly, so that all around the fire had no choice but to hear it, "No. I shall not."

Kili's head shot up. He looked very displeased, eyes wide and indignant, and the rest of the dwarves, to Bilbo's mind, looked surprised and none too pleased either.

Thorin's voice was quiet but firm. "You are not to blame for this, _nidoy,_ any more than you would be at fault for our failure to find water in a desert."

Bilbo was terribly relieved at what seemed to be the very first sign of common sense among the dwarves, though it was entirely unexpected that such sense had come from Thorin of all people and not Kili himself. It had not occurred to him that Kili would seek to take the blame for every misfortune they encountered, and that thought was dismaying indeed.

Kili remained on his knees, frowning fiercely. "If we do not find food soon, we shall starve."

"That may be so," Thorin said. "But you have already been punished for the loss of our supplies, and I shall not punish you again for it. This is the same misfortune, not a new one."

Kili's mouth twisted in frustration. "But–"

Thorin cut him off, looking very displeased. "Do you challenge my authority to make such determinations, _khufud_?" His voice was very low and fierce, and he held himself very still indeed.

Kili blanched. "No, _shemor._"

"Good," Thorin said, that terrible stillness easing, though he still looked displeased.

"Send him off to hunt," Fili said, who alone among the dwarves had continued smoking his pipe throughout the last few minutes as if nothing whatsoever unusual was occurring. "We are far too large a company and make far too much noise. Most assuredly we are scaring off whatever little game there may be. If he goes alone, he may at least find some rabbits."

Thorin grunted. "He cannot go alone."

"He is not going to run off, Uncle."

Bilbo was more than a little affronted on Kili's behalf, as Thorin and Fili were talking about him as if he were not kneeling right there at Thorin's feet; Bilbo felt especially keenly about it because Kili did not look the slightest bit affronted on his own behalf, but Bilbo felt certainly someone ought to be.

"I did not say he would," Thorin said. "Nonetheless, the law is clear. He cannot go alone."

"I can go," Bilbo surprised himself by saying. His voice squeaked rather embarrassingly, so he cleared his throat and tried again. "I can go with him, if he needs to be accompanied."

This generated not a little amusement among the dwarves.

"Mr. Baggins," Thorin said, gruffly though not unkindly, "your offer is appreciated. However, you may not serve as _shemor_. Fíli shall accompany him."

This, at least, provoked a reaction from Kili, though it was hardly a favorable one from what Bilbo could discern. The young dwarf jolted and his face went pale beneath its coat of travel grime, but he did not say anything, though his eyes flickered uneasily to Fíli and back again.

Fili for his part seemed quite as displeased with this arrangement as did his brother — _not his brother,_ Bilbo thought to himself with some irritation, wondering when he was going to be able to get such a simple notion to stick in his foolish head, that brotherhood to the dwarves was far from the simple concept hobbits considered it. But uncomfortable as he seemed, Fili simply nodded to his uncle; it would have been difficult for him to protest too much, Bilbo supposed, seeing as the idea of a hunt had been his own.

"There are still a few hours before the sun fully sets," Thorin said. "If you leave now, you will have the advantage of already being well away by dawn. We can meet you by mid-afternoon at the western fork of the path leading out of the valley."

Fili nodded again and rose to his feet, shouldering his pack. Kili rose too, to walk round the fire and take his own pack, slinging his bow and quiver across his back. If he was unhappy with the arrangement — and from his initial reaction, and the stiff set to his shoulders, he certainly was — he did not say anything about it, though Bilbo supposed that was to be expected. Kili's flash of almost-rebellion notwithstanding (if it could be called rebellion, to demand punishment), Bilbo imagined Kili could hardly even consider flouting any order from Thorin.

"Fili," Thorin said. His voice was low and very serious. In his hand he held the switch, and he reached out now, offering it silently to his nephew.

Fili stood in silence for a moment, then shook his head in three short, sharp bursts of negation. "I will not need it," he said.

Thorin growled. "And what shall you use instead, if you must? Your fists? Your knives? Take it and hope that it shall never leave your pack."

Fili remained rooted in place, and it seemed to Bilbo as if a shudder ran through him slowly from head to toe and back again. "I would not risk it," he said, and his voice was near to cracking. "Uncle, please."

Thorin looked quite fierce and mightily displeased. "One day, you shall be king," he said sternly. "The people will never trust you if you cannot first trust yourself."

Fili nodded then, grim and miserable, but took the switch, though he seemed loath to touch it; he stuffed it quite as far down in his bag as was possible, and packed everything firmly on top of it. If the time came that he needed it, it would take a good many minutes to dig it out.

"Good fortune in your hunt!" Bilbo cried out as Fili and Kili set off on their ponies, for it seemed quite obvious that such would be sorely needed in this dry, empty land. But the dwarves all groaned — fat Bombur even let out a little sob — and both Fili and Kili shot Bilbo dark unhappy looks, so disgruntled that Bilbo determined he had put his foot quite firmly in his mouth, and wished again he knew more of dwarves and their customs.

"Now you've sure and done it, lad," Bofur said, sitting down heavily next to Bilbo as the ponies trotted out of sight.

"But why?" Bilbo asked. "Surely we could all use some good luck about now. What is the harm in wishing for it? I have never been so hungry in all my life."

"_Khazd khuv _have nought but bad luck," Bofur said with a sigh. "The best you can do is hope no luck finds him at all."

This answer left Bilbo very dissatisfied and a little fearful, for he supposed now that if Kili and Fili returned without any food, he himself might be blamed for putting a curse on the hunt. He thought of how his friends at home would laugh at the notion that simple Bilbo Baggins should have the power to inflict a curse on anything or anyone with just a few words, but to the dwarves, Bilbo supposed, it was no laughing matter, and they were quite irritable already and very hungry, and he had no wish at all to have their anger directed at him.

Thorin sat still as the stone trolls in his place by the fire, with Dwalin equally still at his side. The rest of the dwarves had huddled together in family groups, listlessly grooming each other's hair, and only Gandalf and Balin sat unattended. Gandalf was still smoking his pipe, but his eyes held a very distant expression and his lips were moving, as if he were talking to himself or perhaps muttering a spell. Bilbo rather hoped it _was_ a spell, for in their present circumstance they could certainly use whatever help magic might provide.

So Bilbo wandered over to Balin, whose fine grey beard looked rather limp and bedraggled. "Might I sit?" Bilbo asked, and Balin answered with a wordless nod of his head. "I hope," Bilbo began, "that the others will not think I have caused further misfortune with my words. It is only that in the Shire, wishing good luck before any chancy venture is customary. It would be rude to overlook it."

Balin puffed out a small cloud of smoke. "If the lads find food tomorrow, none will remember what you said today. And if they do not find food, I think we shall all be too hungry to worry about assigning blame." They had used up all the last of their supplies for their paltry supper, and there would be no breakfast nor lunch nor any more meals until they found food. "Do not concern yourself unduly, Mr. Baggins."

Bilbo was not overly reassured, but he did not say so, and Balin did not seem inclined to offer further comfort. "If I may," Bilbo said, "and it is not too impertinent a question–" But then he felt that he could not quite bring himself to ask it after all.

Balin puffed a few more times and then said, "About Kili offering himself for punishment? Or Fili being so reluctant to act as _shemor_?"

"Well," Bilbo said, "both, actually, though more the latter. For although I do not fully understand this business of _khazd khuv_, I begin to see how Kili views his place in the world." And quite a low place it was too. Bilbo had quite a few thoughts about _that_, but he kept them to himself.

"Aye," Balin said. His voice and face was sad. "'Tis a shame. He is a good lad, hard-working and loyal and clever. Had Dís but lived a little while longer, his life would have been very different. And Fili's too, of course." He puffed on his pipe a few times, lost in thought. "I tell you this as a member of our company," he said, "and because I believe I can trust in your discretion. It is no great secret, mind you, but not something I would tell to any stranger on the road."

Bilbo nodded. "I am grateful for your trust."

Balin settled back against his pack, his legs stretched out in front of him. "When do hobbits come of age?" he asked.

"When we have reached the age of 33," Bilbo said, assuming the question was not so unrelated to the topic at hand as it appeared. "About the age of 20, for a lifetime of Man."

Balin nodded. "A very sensible age. Dwarves come of age at 50."

"Why," Bilbo said, "that is exactly how old I am!"

Balin raised his eyebrows. "Indeed!" he said. "I should not tell the others, if I were you. They will tease you mightily!" But then he puffed again on his pipe. "A dwarf lad of 50 is still a stripling, not even yet full grown. Though he must take responsibility for his own decisions, he will still think and act like a child. It is a difficult thing for some, to have adulthood so suddenly thrust upon them."

"I can but imagine," Bilbo said, working out the math and realizing to his dismay that under dwarf custom, he would have come of age at the tender age of 20, when the hair on his feet had only just begun to grow and he'd yet been prone to playing tricks on all the neighbors.

"When Fili had just come of age," Balin said, "Thorin had to travel to a nearby village to broker a settlement between two quarreling families. The whole trip was to take three days, perhaps only two if the families could agree to reasonable terms. And so Thorin left Fili as _shemor_ for Kili."

Bilbo swallowed, for he had begun to get a very unpleasant feeling in his stomach.

"Fili was just a child," Balin said, "no matter that he'd had his coming-of-age ceremony two months before."

"And something went wrong," Bilbo guessed.

"Aye," Balin said. "Something broke in the house. Just a trifle, really, but it was a keepsake from Dís. I never learned how it happened, but it didn't matter, for under the law, Kili bore the blame."

"Oh," Bilbo said quietly. "And Fili — "

"Fili was _shemor_," Balin said, "though that power should never have been given to one so young. Thorin was much older when that responsibility fell to him, and he was always scrupulous not to misuse it. But Fili was just a boy. He understood the rules of _khazd khuv_ well enough, but did not yet truly understand what it meant to be _shemor_. It is far more than meting out punishment." He sighed. "It took Oín a full afternoon to stitch Kili up, and it was near a week before the poor lad could walk upright. Thorin has not asked Fili to be _shemor_ since then, not, I think, for lack of opportunity, but because Fili fears to take that responsibility again."

"Fili seems a quite responsible young dwarf now," Bilbo said slowly. "I am quite sure he would not harm Kili."

"Aye," Balin said, nodding. "I think we are all quite sure of that, except for Fili himself."

That night Bilbo had a horrible dream in which he dug up all the flowers in the Old Took's garden and Bungo came after him with a switch brandished over his head like an axe and yelling in Khuzdul, which Bilbo understood quite well in the dream though of course he actually spoke not a word of that ancient Dwarf tongue. He woke up sweating and anxious and quite out of sorts, even though in reality when the flower incident had been discovered — for it must be said that young master Bilbo had indeed played a prank in the Old Took's garden — his parents had made him replace all the flowers and had then spent several days being very silently annoyed in Bilbo's general direction, which had been far worse than any other punishment they could have devised.

It took Bilbo quite some time to recover from his dreadful dream, and he was slow and distracted as he packed up his bedroll and sorted through his things. Bilbo was so hungry he did not see how he could possibly travel, and all the dwarves were in a similar sorry condition, and so it was fortunate indeed that they had their ponies, for otherwise they might not have been able to manage even a single mile. As it was, it took them quite a long time to tidy up the campsite and mount their ponies, and it was a very lethargic company indeed that rode slowly across the valley on that bright, sunny day.

It was no small relief, then, when early in the afternoon Ori suddenly shouted, "I see them! I see them!" and began waving frantically in the direction of a pair of dark smudges on the horizon. Bilbo thought for a moment that if it had been a pair of orcs, they would certainly have been in trouble, for he doubted that a single one of them had enough strength remaining to lift a sword. But momentarily the smudges resolved into the welcome shapes of two dwarves on ponies, and all the dwarves began waving then, a little hysterically, and Bilbo felt very definitely cheered when the distant dwarves began waving jauntily back.

Fili and Kili quickly crossed the valley to them, and they were riding so swiftly that Bilbo was certain they must have found some food, or they would not have been so spry and cheerful. And it proved marvelously true, for when Fili dismounted, he held a brace of neatly skinned rabbits in one hand and a pair of pheasant in the other, trussed and ready for roasting.

He handed the rabbits and birds to hovering Bofur. "Dwalin, Gloín. Kili will need your help dismounting. Oín, he will need your attention afterwards. He stepped in a rabbit hole." He said this rather merrily. "His ankle is twisted, but not, I think, broken."

The rest of the dwarves seemed to perk up at this somewhat distressing news, and Bofur even flashed a grin at Bilbo, which overall Bilbo found to be very disconcerting. But perhaps, he thought, it was simply because there was food in their immediate future, and not that they were taking pleasure in Kili's misfortune.

"You misunderstand them," Gandalf said, materializing at Bilbo's shoulder. He too looked cheerful, though in his case Bilbo was certain it was to do with the imminence of a proper lunch and nothing to do with Kili's injury. "They are quite convinced Kili can have no good luck without an attendant misfortune. In this case, a twisted ankle is a very minor price to pay for a solid meal."

"If it were me," Bilbo said sourly, "I would have stepped in the rabbit hole on purpose."

Gandalf raised an eyebrow at him, eyes twinkling. "And who is to say that Kili did not?"

* * *

A/N: So, things are perhaps a little more complex than you might have thought. Rather tangled relationship between Thorin and Kili and Fili, hmm?

Comments and concrit adored, truly.

P.S. I am giving up on chapter titles because I am terrible at them. If one of you dear readers has a brilliant suggestion, I will use it!


	6. Rivendell

The mood of the Company was much improved by their meal; though there was little enough meat to go around, it was still far more substantial than anything else they had eaten for the past few days, and dwarves are ultimately a merry sort of folk, and certainly hobbits are as well. But it was not so very many hours later that Bombur began worrying aloud about where their next meal should come from, and of course that concern spread through the company as quick as could be.

"We have no choice," Gandalf was overheard to say to Thorin. "For we are 14 altogether, and it would take Kili and Fili all day to hunt enough to keep us fed, and then we should make hardly any progress at all towards our goal."

"I do not trust the elves," Thorin grumbled, looking mightily displeased.

"You need not trust them," Gandalf said with a certain amount of exasperation. "But we are sorely in need of food and a safe place to rest, and they can provide both."

Thorin conceded the logic and they set forth for Rivendell wherein some hospitable elves resided, but Thorin was still quite out of sorts and would not partake in any singing or storytelling or even so much as smoke his pipe. Bilbo for his part was very excited and could barely sit still on his pony, for his mother had told him many stories of the elves, but he had met only a few in his life, and then only briefly; he had never even had one over for tea! He could hardly wait to meet them properly, imagining them to be altogether more exotic than dwarves, who now that Bilbo had come to know them, seemed not so very much different than hobbits after all, though they were certainly more boisterous and altogether too fond of their weapons, and hardly fond enough of baths.

It took another day of hard traveling to reach the valley of the elves, and they found naught to eat but some berries on their way, but oh, Bilbo could not have imagined a more wondrous and beautiful place than Rivendell, which made the arduous trip quite worth it. Even the dwarves seemed impressed, though they took great pains to hide it in noisy, showy bluster.

The elves knew all their names quite before any introductions had been made, which Bilbo found quite astounding but the dwarves found very suspicious; the company took to muttering to each other and casting dark glances in the elves' directions whenever they would come near. The elves themselves were unlike any creatures Bilbo had ever met, lively and cheery and full of song — songs all the time, for every occasion; songs full of good-natured teasing, songs which would start at the very drop of a hat, and to which in some mysterious manner the elves seemed to know all the words, even if each appeared to be made up on the spot as it went along.

Bilbo felt quite short and stubby and dirty next to the elves, who were as tall as Gandalf but much more slender, as graceful as if they were made of gossamer, and who looked always as clean and neat as if they had just stepped out of the bath. And oh, the baths themselves were utterly splendid and made Bilbo feel as if his bathrooms at Bag End — widely considered the best appointed in the whole of the Shire — were nothing more than the crudest of outhouses.

After spending a decadent amount of time bathing, from which he emerged smelling of the most lovely, fragrant flowers, Bilbo dressed in his cleanest clothing — which was not altogether very clean, but in which he at least felt presentable — and went to join the dwarves and their hosts for what he hoped would be a very substantial supper. And indeed the table was set for a proper feast, with overflowing plates filled with a most wondrous number of different foodstuffs — fruits and breads and honeys and meats of every possible shape and size and texture. It set Bilbo's mouth to drooling and it took all his will to wait until Thorin arrived before sitting down to eat, though the dwarves were not so courteous and had already commenced their meal with considerable vigor.

Bilbo sat down on a small bench off to the side, so as not to torment himself with the sight and smell of food while he waited. Gandalf also had remained standing, and was nearby, engaged in deep and apparently very serious conversation with their host, Lord Elrond, a very tall elf with a formidable mien, who was frowning quite severely.

"It is out of the question," Elrond said, looking most fiercely displeased.

"They will be here but for a short while," Gandalf said. "I ask only that you accept the situation, not that you condone it."

"You ask far worse, Mithrandir. You ask that I abet it. I will not."

Gandalf sighed heavily. Bilbo was momentarily relieved that it was not just dwarves and hobbits who tried his patience. "You cannot change the weather of the world with but a wish, my friend."

"It is better to wish than to idly stand by while the storm blows past you. Would you feel the same if the boy was in collar and shackles?"

Gandalf's scowl would have put any frown of Thorin's to shame. "Do not overstretch your comparison. He is no slave."

Elrond made a disgusted noise. "Is he not? He has had his mind poisoned from the moment of his birth."

"He is no slave," Gandalf insisted. "And if you persist in this course of action, you will make no one more uncomfortable that Kili himself."

It was only then that Bilbo noticed that there was but one table, with 14 dwarf and hobbit-sized chairs arrayed around it, and a larger one that would suit a wizard. And he found that he was quite unsure what to think about it, for he was certain that Gandalf was correct — poor Kili would be quite miserable at being forced to sit with the other dwarves, and might just pass up dinner altogether, and that was no solution at all. Bilbo looked frantically around, wondering if perhaps he could ask the elves for a second, smaller table; he was, after all, a bit smaller than the dwarves, and the elves were certainly gracious hosts, and perhaps he and Kili could have a nice meal to themselves, and no one need be uncomfortable at all.

Bilbo was on the verge of interrupting Gandalf and Elrond to suggest this plan, when Elrond muttered something that Bilbo was rather certain was a swear word, and then called out, "Lindir!"

Another tall elf — to be honest, Bilbo had yet to see a _short_ elf — appeared from nowhere, and nodded deferentially.

Elrond spoke swiftly in the elf tongue, lips tight with disapproval, and after a moment the second elf nodded and glided swiftly away.

"An elegant solution," Gandalf murmured quietly.

Elrond frowned. "I do this only out of respect for you, and of desire to do no further harm to the boy. They may stay a few days to rest and recover, but then they must leave, Mithrandir."

Gandalf nodded graciously. "Understood." And then their conversation turned to other matters which sounded dark and mysterious, and Bilbo found he would rather not know of such things at all, so he hummed softly to himself and sat on the bench and swung his legs back and forth as if he were a child.

After a very long time, or so it seemed, Thorin appeared with Fili at his side and Kili accompanying them both, no longer even limping. Bilbo supposed with satisfaction that the elves had attended to his ankle. They were all clean, or at least as clean as Bilbo, which is to say their hair had been washed and groomed, and most of the dirt was gone from their skin. Kili had shaved, and he looked quite young with his hair long and loose and his chin as bare as any hobbit. Almost as soon as they entered the room, two new elves followed them in, tall and thin and dark, with identical faces wearing broad, identical smiles.

"Greetings, dwarves," they said, bowing slightly. "Mithrandir. Father."

Elrond nodded back at them. "Gandalf, you remember my sons."

"Indeed I do," Gandalf said graciously. "Elladan. Elrohir. You have not aged at all." Somehow, it did not quite sound like a compliment, though his expression was mild and pleasant.

"But you have, Grandfather," one of them said mischievously. "I swear your beard grows ever more grey each time we meet."

"And your nose grows as well!" the other added.

Then, "Dwarves!" the first cried. "We understand there is an archer among you."

"We are great archers," the other said.

"We have never met a dwarf archer," the first said. "And we have met many, many archers in our years."

Bilbo found it quite dizzying to turn his head back and forth between the two identical faces, and rather wished only one felt it necessary to speak.

"We would dine with the dwarf archer!"

"We have many tales to tell."

"And we would shoot with him as well!"

"Yes, we have never shot with a dwarf archer!"

"Come, come," one said — Bilbo had quite lost track at this point of whether this was the first or second — "who is it? Tell us, for we are very eager to meet him."

The dwarves were all silent, gaping, which Bilbo found very understandable. Finally, Thorin cleared his throat. "Kili," he said, prodding him forward gently. "Kili is our archer."

"Marvelous!" one of the twins said.

"Wonderful!" the other cried, and they descended on Kili rather like a swarm of bees, and before anyone could say another word, they had hustled him off and out of the room, chattering away in broken sentences the whole time. Poor Kili's head was turning back and forth between the two elves so quickly Bilbo that was certain he would develop a crick in his neck.

The room seemed much quieter after the twins were gone, enough so that Bilbo was able to hear Gandalf's murmured, "Well done," to Elrond, but the dwarves could not stay silent for long, and soon enough fell again to their feast, and it was a very merry dinner indeed.

Even years later, Bilbo believed his stay in Rivendell to be some of the most splendid days of his life. The elves were perfectly gracious hosts, and the Company's every need quickly attended to. They never lacked for sufficient food, even by a hobbit's high standards, and their every bruise was healed, every tear in their clothing expertly mended. Bilbo and Ori spent many long hours roaming the elves' expansive library, whispering to each other that they should be quite content to spend years and years within its paneled walls, and what time remained Bilbo spent wandering the lush, immaculately tended gardens.

He never lacked for company if he wanted it, for there were always elves about and they were always more than happy to speak with him and tell him wondrous tales, and of course the dwarves were ever-present, gradually losing their looks of pinched hunger as frequent, filling meals restored the strength to their sturdy frames. Fili and Dwalin in particular Bilbo saw quite a lot of, as they seemed to have taken on the roles of guardians, and were ever wandering the halls doing headcounts on the dwarves — to what end, Bilbo couldn't guess, unless it was simply that they were unaccustomed to inactivity and made up a task to keep themselves occupied.

Bilbo saw Kili almost not at all during these few peaceful days, and when he did, the dwarf was always surrounded by elves — Lord Elrond's sons, at first, who appeared quite genuinely taken with him and spent many long hours tutoring him at the archery range; but then other elves as well, all always quite merry, laughing and singing and plying Kili with food and drink and flowers; they had also outfitted him with what appeared to be new traveling clothes, made of soft elvish leather that fit him like a second skin. Kili, from what Bilbo could tell, seemed perplexed by the attention but not averse to it, and by the end of their visit he seemed to have grown quite comfortable in the elves' company, talking freely with them and letting them comb and fix his hair, though he would not consent to any braids nor beads at all, no matter how much they pleaded.

Altogether it was a much more cheerful company that left Rivendell than arrived there, though Thorin was still prone to grumbling about meddlesome elves and all the dwarves insulted the new stitching in their clothing, though from what Bilbo could see, the new seams were far sturdier than the old and the other repairs nearly invisible, so neatly were they sewn. But they were well-fed and well-rested and well-provisioned, and Bilbo found there was very little to complain about except that they could not have stayed longer in Rivendell's halls and gardens.

The dwarves seemed far more content than Bilbo to be on the road again, and they passed the time singing cheerfully bawdy songs and telling tales of old battles and glory, as if to remind themselves of their dwarfishness after days with the elves, and that first night they had quite a splendid smoke ring competition — from which Gandalf was excluded, and in which Bilbo acquitted himself very respectably — as they sat round the cheery fire.

The dwarves were up with the sun the next morning, and Bofur set to preparing breakfast in no particular hurry while Thorin and Gandalf huddled over the map, arguing companionably about the best road to take to avoid orcs and trolls and other unpleasant creatures. Kili had wandered some little distance away, and was standing with his bow out, scowling at a target he had tacked up to a tree. In his fine elvish leathers and with his hair neatly tended, he looked quite like the young prince he ought to have been, had things worked out differently at his birth.

"Why, Master Kili," Bilbo said as he approached. "Why are you frowning on such a fine day as this? The sun is shining and soon we shall have a lovely breakfast."

"Good morning, Mr. Baggins," Kili said politely. "The day is fine indeed. I am merely trying to remember how to shoot properly, for the elves filled my head with a lot of nonsense. One would think they had invented the bow, for all their boasting. They were quite insistent I correct my stance." He shifted his feet fractionally and asked, with not a little indignation, "Do you suppose I could aim better like _this?_"

"I'm afraid I could not tell you," Bilbo said, confounded, for Kili's feet seemed to have moved hardly at all as to deserve such disdain. "I have never shot an arrow in all my life. In fact, I have never been so near a bow as this."

Kili looked astounded by this. "Never? But neither had you ever held a sword, before we found you a blade in the trolls' cave. What then, is your weapon of choice?"

"I can be quite dangerous with a pair of kitchen shears," Bilbo said, but Kili did not seem to find that answer at all funny, and frowned a little harder.

"The Shire is not so remote as all that, Mr. Baggins. How shall you defend yourself if enemies descend upon you?"

Bilbo had never given much consideration one way or the other to such matters; the thought of any enemies in the Shire was both laughable and frightening at the same time.

"Well," Kili said, "you shall have to speak to Mr. Dwalin about training with your dagger. But I can teach you to use a bow, if you would like." He seemed suddenly shy then, as if he had been too forward, and indeed, his demeanor during this entire conversation had been very different from their previous interactions; Bilbo wondered if perhaps the time spent with the elves had had a greater effect on Kili than anyone had guessed.

"I think I should like that," Bilbo said. "I have quite excellent aim, at least with rocks."

"Then you have already mastered the hardest aspect of archery," Kili said kindly, "and I am sure you will be a quick study of the rest."

The next hour was very pleasant, as Kili proved to be a patient and kind instructor. By the end of it Bilbo was able to pull back a bowstring to Kili's satisfaction; Bilbo had scraped his cheek several times but only lightly, and he judged it a fair price to pay for what he had learned. Sometime during the lesson both Fili and Ori had wandered by and settled down a safe distance away to watch — as the lesson progressed they took to loudly offering advice as to Bilbo's stance and form and general grooming habits; Kili quietly advised him to ignore them. "It is good training," he said, "for in battle, you cannot be distracted by the catcalls of your foe, but must always maintain your focus."

Bilbo was genuinely curious. "Have you been in many battles, then?"

"No," Kili said. "It is very peaceful in Ered Luin, but for the occasional attack by bandits along the roads. And I do not think I would be very welcome in a company of warriors — no one would seek to take the risk that bad luck would befall them in the midst of battle, nor would I seek to bring ill fortune to any comrade."

Bilbo sighed rather heavily. "It pains me when you say such things, Master Kili."

"It is the way of things, Mr. Baggins," Kili said with a shrug. "I know you do not believe it. The elves took similar offense on my behalf. I assure you it bothers you far more than me."

"I do not understand it, that is all," Bilbo said, "how you can be content to accept such a thing. Surely you must know you did nothing wrong by being born."

"If I believed that, Mr. Baggins," Kili said slowly, "it would make my life quite tragic indeed."

* * *

A/N: Many thanks to acciojd for the title for the last chapter!

And heartfelt thanks to all who have taken the time to drop me a note. It's very much appreciated.


	7. Bow

Days passed, some slowly, some quickly, as they climbed into the Misty Mountains, and Bilbo was never so glad for a pony as he was for Mabel on that long, slow climb — not that he had ever had occasion to be happy for a pony before he had left the Shire. But still, the trail grew more difficult as they progressed, and Bilbo's little hobbit legs, which had served him well all his life, proved not quite equal to the task of keeping up with the even more sturdy legs of the dwarves, and so he rode his pony as often as he could, though there were parts of the trail too narrow and rocky to trust in anything but his own two hairy feet.

Days there were when they saw the sun not at all, and on those Bilbo was sore and regretful he had ever left Bag-End, but some days were bright and sunny and full of cheer, and on those days, Bilbo's heart was full of excitement and adventure even as he trudged step after weary step up an ever-steeper path. Thinner they all grew, though they had enough to eat, but hours of walking will trim away the fat on even the jolliest of hobbits, and it must be said that even Bombur found it necessary to tighten his belt, to his great dismay and his brother's amusement, and Bofur even wrote a little song about it that quickly became a favorite among all the Company.

One cloudy afternoon, not so very long after they had finished with their lunch, they came upon a wet and treacherous slope, and try as they might, they could not climb it without slipping and sliding backwards, and in a very short while Oín and Gloín and Nori and Ori were covered in mud — Dori, somehow, had escaped this great calamity unscathed, his intricate braids still perfectly intact — and Thorin called an early halt. "For the sun is peeking through the clouds," he said, "and the mud will dry overnight, if we but wait," and so they settled in for the afternoon, making camp as best they could in the flattest area they could find, and Oín and Gloín and Nori and Ori all went off to find some water for washing, for they were truly covered in mud from head to toe to the tips of their beards.

Kili disappeared immediately to tend to the ponies, but as they had been walking for but half a day, there was no great need of tending, and even after he had brushed them all down quite thoroughly and fed them all, there were still hours before dinner. And so Thorin set him to finding wood for the evening's fire, and though this was not so simple a task for there were very few trees upon the mountain, Bilbo volunteered to help and the two of them spent a pleasant enough hour under increasingly sunny skies, scrounging what they could find. And then there was truly not a single task to which Kili could be set, for the elves had repaired all their packs and clothes and sharpened their weapons, and Bombur would allow no one to help with dinner, not even Thorin, and certainly not Kili.

Oh, if Bilbo had but known this was to be their last pleasant afternoon for quite some time, he would have enjoyed it more thoroughly! But of course he had no way of knowing such a thing, and it is true too that if _had_ known what was to come, he would have not had enjoyed the lazy day as much as he did, for he would have spent it fretting. But the sun crept indolently across the sky while Bombur fussed with the dinner pot and the rest of the dwarves gathered together talking of nothing in particular, and Gandalf napped, his great gray hat perched precariously over his face to shield it from the sun. Bilbo felt that for a brief moment, all was as peaceful as it could be.

But then he saw Kili sitting by himself, staring with great concentration at an odd-looking instrument in his hands, and it seemed the sun grew a little less warm on Bilbo's face, for it was very sad to see the twelve dwarves in a cluster, smiling and laughing and singing, and the thirteenth dwarf excluded as always.

So Bilbo approached Kili and sat down right beside him, and Kili by this point was used enough to it that he did move away at all, but instead just nodded politely. "What is that you have in your hands?" Bilbo asked, genuinely curious, for now that he was close enough to see, the contraption looked very clever indeed, carved wood and engraved metal and even some sort of string. It looked somewhat like a puzzle box, folded up around gleaming silver hinges.

"It is a bow," Kili said. "Gifted to me by the elves, and crafted, they say, by Rergin himself."

Bilbo frowned. "Who is Rergin?"

"A dwarf craftsman of old," Kili said. "I thought he was a legend. They say he crafted the only weapons Durin would accept."

"Then that is quite a gift," Bilbo said in some astonishment. "Though it does not look so very much like a bow to me."

"It folds for travel," Kili said, sounding full of admiration. "It is quite ingeniously designed." But his brow furrowed as he said it, and he made no move to unfold the bow, but rather turned it around and around in his hands.

"Well," Bilbo said, "there were a few spots where we gathered wood that might serve as a practice range, if you are of a mind to test it out. We have some time before dinner."

"Yes," Kili said, but he still made no move to rise, and instead fell back to staring at the bow, as if it possessed some great secret he could divine by simply staring at it.

"I would not mind another lesson myself," Bilbo suggested, though he spoke tentatively, for something was surely wrong, though he knew not what. "The day has become so pleasant, I feel quite confident I could even manage to loose an arrow without injuring myself too badly."

Kili smiled at that, which Bilbo took to be a great victory, for the lad rarely smiled, nor hardly even grinned, and Bilbo had set for himself a mission to one day make him laugh, but such things took time, he knew. "Then let us set up a range, Mr. Baggins," Kili said. He rose to his feet, but he tucked the folded contraption back into his pack, and reached instead for his regular bow.

"Will you not try it, then?" Bilbo asked curiously. "It appears quite wondrously compact. I can scarcely credit that it unfolds to a bow."

"I can assure you, it does," Kili said. "I have seen it with my own eyes, back in Rivendell." But he left it there nonetheless, and began making his way up the side of the mountain, towards a small clearing they had discovered earlier in the day.

"Then why do you leave it behind?" Bilbo asked, scrambling a bit to keep up, for he was not nearly so agile as the young dwarf, and had quite often to resort to using his hands to keep his balance.

Kili turned, frowning when he saw Bilbo flailing on the uneven ground, and hesitantly reaching a hand out, as if he was not sure the contact would be welcome. And perhaps it would not have been, had Bilbo been a stubborn dwarf, but he was a very sensible hobbit and would not turn down a hand offered in friendship. He gripped Kili's hand firmly and held it firmly until he was able to stand steadily on his own two feet.

"It was crafted for Durin," Kili said in a very low voice, though there was no one near to overhear them. "And meant only for his heirs. The elves kept it in safekeeping until an archer of Durin's line arose to claim it."

"And they gifted it to you," Bilbo said. "Well, that's quite a pickle, and no mistake." He allowed himself a moment of irritation at the elves, though he was certainly sympathetic to their distaste for the traditions of _khazd khuv_. But placing such a weapon in Kili's hands could only lead to heartache for all involved.

"I am of Durin's blood," Kili said uncertainly. "No circumstance of my birth can change that. But I am no heir to anyone."

"Well," Bilbo said, and then he thought for a moment and said, "well" again, for he was not sure at all what else he could say. Kili was silent too, and set to tacking up a target on a large bush, and pacing back a careful distance to draw a line in the dirt at their feet. "What does Thorin say about it?" Bilbo finally asked, for if anyone would understand the complex rules governing Kili's life, it would be his unc — _shemor._

"He does not know," Kili said uncomfortably. He would not meet Bilbo's eyes, even as he swung the bow off his back and placed it carefully into Bilbo's hands. "I have not told him. I am afraid he will take it away, and I — " His voice dropped down to a bare whisper. "I do not want him to take it." His eyes flew up to Bilbo's, and they were conflicted and upset. "I know that it's wrong. I am just a _khufud_. _Khazd khuv_ have no rights to any possessions. Everything belongs to my _shemor_ — to Thorin. But it is a bow — he would have no use for it and the elves — they said it was meant for me."

"Well," Bilbo said again, for lack of anything else. Kili's hands were gently guiding him into the proper form, and though it had been several days, Bilbo began to remember how to hold the bow properly, and how to draw and release the bowstring without doing too much damage to his cheek. "Well," he said presently, "my mother always said that keeping a secret is like holding a live firework in your pocket. Far better to set it free than wait for it to explode while still tucked away in your trousers. Perhaps Thorin will surprise you."

"Perhaps," Kili said, but he looked troubled, and spoke no more of the bow for the remainder of the time they stayed in the little clearing, until Ori's voice came wafting up from below, calling them back for dinner.

* * *

And now we deviate just a little farther from canon ...

Thank you as always to everyone who takes the time to review. It really makes my day. I apologize if I don't respond immediately, but I always will respond!

And thanks again to my beta Sapphiremuse, whom I don't thank after every chapter but I really should, because she does a stellar job.


	8. Goblins

A/N:

A friendly warning - this story is obviously written from Bilbo's POV but to the extent that there are bits of Bilbo's narrative that are rather crucial to The Hobbit but irrelevant to _this_ story, I am freely making use of massive handwaving and glossing over.

:: cough ::

Gollum

:: cough ::

Just so you are not surprised at how mightily certain things are condensed. :)

P.S. This chapter has one of my favorite parts in it. See if you can figure out which one. I also stole at least a couple of sentences straight from Tolkien.

* * *

The sun was indeed kind enough to dry the muddy trail and make it passable, and the next morning was spent in cheery conversation as they climbed, the previous day's rest renewing their spirits and energy. But by the afternoon of that same day, the clouds had rolled in again and soon enough a fierce storm broke out, full of monstrous bolts of lightning and the fierce, never-ending roar of thunder. The rain lashed at them so ferociously they were forced to take shelter under an overhanging rock where they huddled, miserable and cold and frightened. Well, at least Bilbo was frightened, and he suspected at least some of the dwarves were as well, though of course they would not admit it.

"This is no ordinary storm," Gandalf shouted, voice raised above the howl of the wind. "It is a battle of the thunder giants!"

And indeed it was, for now that Bilbo knew to look, he could see the great creatures across the valley, giants made of stone, and they were hurling rocks at one another for a game, and catching them, and tossing them down into the darkness where they smashed among the trees far below, or splintered into little bits with a bang.

"We cannot stay here!" Thorin shouted. "If we don't get blown off, or drowned, or struck by lightning, we shall get picked up by some giant and kicked sky-high for a football."

Bilbo found this grim assessment very alarming, and his mood was not in the least bit improved by Gandalf's grumpy reply, "Well, if you know of anywhere better, take us there!" It seemed to Bilbo then that perhaps being a wizard did not gift one with very many extraordinary skills beyond the creation of wondrous fireworks and smoke rings, if Gandalf could not even manage to keep the rain out of his own face or find them someplace dry to take shelter. Then, while Bilbo was scolding himself for that ungenerous thought, Thorin and the other dwarves fell to arguing about the best course of action, and eventually decided to send Fili and Kili off to scout for a suitable cave. Not all agreed; even as the lads crept along the path buffeted by the wind and rain, the other dwarves were arguing still whether Kili should make matters worse by staying or going. Bilbo was gratified that at the very least they waited until Kili was out of earshot before expressing their reservations, especially since he felt that things as they were could not get very much worse at all.

It was not a very long time before Fili and Kili came back — so short a time, in fact, that the dwarves were still arguing over whether Kili should have gone by the time he and Fili returned. "We have found a dry cave," Fili said, and it was right around the next corner, and large enough for the whole Company, even the ponies. And though Gandalf was suspicious — rightfully so, as was soon proved — the dwarves were eager enough to get in from the storm that they overlooked Fili's obvious lie that they had thoroughly explored the cave, and Kili's guilty expression.

At first the cave was everything they had hoped, warm and dry and entirely sheltered from the wind and rain and even the roar of the stone giants at play. And it also seemed safe enough, for they explored it by the light of Gandalf's wand and nothing seemed too obviously amiss, and so they settled down for as pleasant an evening as they could manage, which was certainly bound to be more pleasant than if they had stayed outside.

Gandalf would not permit them to light a fire, but they made the best dinner they could out of cold meats, and they sat around afterwards and talked and smoked. Kili of course tended to the ponies, who were more than happy for the attention, and stood placidly chewing from their feedbags. Then Bilbo caught a glimpse of Kili digging in his pack, and it seemed he was fingering again the dwarvish bow the elves had gifted to him, but then Thorin called him over for some trivial chore, and Kili jumped to his feet and shoved the bow in some pocket in his overcoat so it would not be seen. When Bilbo caught his attention a little later and stared pointedly at the small bulge in his coat, Kili looked away and would not meet his eyes. Bilbo thought that this bow would most certainly be the cause of trouble later, especially if Kili could not help but look so guilty about it, but then Bilbo also thought that Kili had probably never kept a secret in his whole life, and perhaps it was a healthy thing that he should do so now, for surely no one can go through life without keeping a single secret at all, not even little hobbits safe in the Shire, whether they be firework secrets or not.

The wind and rain continued late into the night; Bilbo's sleep was poor because of it, restless and filled with disturbing dreams. And then his bad dreams came to life, for in the middle of the night they were attacked by goblins! The creatures swarmed from a hidden door, and the dwarves were very quickly overcome, Dwalin standing watch uselessly at the front of the cave while the goblins attacked from the back. The goblins pushed and bullied them out of the cave and down into a dark, foreboding tunnel, chortling with glee over the fresh ponies and all the wonderful supplies the dwarves had been carrying in their packs.

In a trice they were all disarmed and bound at the wrist in chains, lined up in a very sorry row of 13 dwarves and one hobbit, but no wizard. Where Gandalf was no one knew, but fortunately they kept their wits about them enough not to wonder out loud where their wizard had gone, so that the goblins did not know he had escaped, and that was the only bright thought at this very gloomy moment. The goblins pushed them in a very rough manner down the dark and meandering halls, and Bilbo thought that there were so many twists and turns, he would never have found his way out again, even if there had been light enough for seeing.

Bilbo had been shackled at the very end of the line, for the goblins did not know what to make of him, having never seen a hobbit before, but though they poked and prodded at him a little longer than at the dwarves, they were eager to return to the depths of Goblin Town, where, they said, "The Goblin King shall figure out what to do with them all, even the strange little one." They walked and walked, deeper and deeper under the mountain, and after a while the goblins began to sing. This should not have been so surprising as it was, for everyone knows that goblins are descended from elves, but Bilbo was not expecting creatures so foul as these to make any sort of music. But it was quite horrible music indeed, perfectly suited to the horrible goblins, and Bilbo wished his hands were free so that he could cover his ears and not have to listen to even a single note of that foul song.

As they walked ever deeper underground, Bilbo found he was shaking quite ferociously, so that the chains that bound him were rattling, and Dori in front of him kept whispering at him to hush, for he would only make matters worse for himself if the goblins knew quite how afraid he was. Goblins, you see, are just the sort of evil creatures to take delight in others' fear and misery. In fact, there is very little good that can be said of goblins at all, and the world would be far better off without their sort. Even years later, Bilbo could not think of a single kind word for them in his memoirs, but described them as quite ill-tempered, which was the worst insult he could bear to put down in ink.

After a very long walk they reached Goblin Town, and a more frightful place Bilbo could not have imagined, full as it was of goblins of every shape and size, and jeering at them viciously. And in the center of the town there was a grand square, and in that square they were brought in front of the Goblin King himself, the most grotesque creature any of them had ever seen.

Thorin kept his wits about him, and tried to pretend they were but a traveling company, of no purpose other than to visit relatives across the mountain, and though they tried to pretend they were simply a traveling company, the King recognized Thorin Oakenshield immediately and was very pleased to have him in his clutches.

It might have worked too, but by the light of the many torches that lit the square, the goblins had been rummaging through all they had stolen from the dwarves, and it did not take them very long to discover the goblin-cleaver Orcrist among the dwarves' weapons. At that the goblins let out an angry cry, and started yelling and rushing around in a wild panic, for though they outnumbered the dwarves by many thousands, they were still superstitiously afraid of that dreaded blade. Even the Goblin King himself was afraid of that sword, though of course he was the king and would not show it in front of his subjects. Instead he masked his fear with a most terrible display of rage, and called the dwarves liars and murderers, and ordered them taken away and down to the dungeons where a most horrible fate certainly awaited them.

Thank goodness Gandalf showed up again just at that moment with his own blade Glamdring, which was just as feared as Orcrist — even more feared, if that were possible — and slayed the Goblin King in a flash and bid the dwarves to run for their lives. Run they did, as quickly as they could, though it was hard, chained in a line as they were, but terror is a great motivator and the pounding feet of the goblin hordes behind them set them scurrying as fast as they were able.

When they were all quite out of breath, Gandalf let them rest for just a moment while he freed them from their chains with his wand. Bilbo regretted then his earlier very ungenerous thoughts towards Gandalf, for right now it seemed that wizards were capable of truly wondrous and useful magic indeed! But no sooner was the company loose than Gandalf bade them run again, and quickly, for the goblins were right on their heels, and gaining rapidly. All the swords they had among them were two, Orcrist and Glamdring, though Fili had managed to keep hold of a small dagger and knife, tucked neatly away in some hidden sheaths under his coat, and Dwalin likewise had a knife in his boot, and even Bilbo had his little dagger tucked safely away in his breeches, but little good two swords, two knives and two daggers would be against many hundreds of angry goblins!

They ran as fast as they could, but were unpleasantly surprised when the goblins came at their front from around the corner, and there was nothing for it but to fight. Thorin and Gandalf drew their mighty swords and slew as many goblins as they could; just the sight of Orcrist and Glamdring was enough to set many of the goblins scurrying away in fear, and Fili and Dwalin with their smaller blades helped beat the others back as best they could. But the goblins were sneaky and not so stupid as might be supposed, and though they were horrible to look at and loathsome of manner, they were very smart at devising all manner of evil.

And so the goblins set to with the few archers among the hordes — goblins, as noted, being bred from elves, and so quite comfortable with bow and arrow — and though the dark hallways of the mountain were not an ideal place for such a weapon, the goblins themselves cared little for the lives of their brethren at the front of the pack, and so the archers sent arrows flying towards the dwarves, heedless of whether they happened to hit a few goblins by accident. This was a calamity indeed, for the only light there was shone from the elvish blades and Gandalf's wand, and it was nearly impossible to see the goblins' arrows as they flew through the air.

The dwarves hollered and threw themselves to the ground, and it was quite a miracle that none of them were seriously wounded by those arrows, though several suffered minor scrapes and torn coats and poor Dori had one of his braids sliced right off. Then Gandalf muttered something under his breath and his wand and Glamdring and Orcrist began to shine with such a fierce light that the goblins screeched and ran away to the safety of their foul dark tunnels, and the dwarves took the opportunity to run as fast as they could in the opposite direction.

They ran and they ran, for so long that Bilbo was utterly exhausted and did not think he could carry on for one more step; even the dwarves were starting to lag, when suddenly more goblins snuck up from behind, for they had many secret paths in the mountain and could be as quiet as elves when they wanted. One of the goblins grabbed Ori, who let out a shriek of terror, but before he was carried away to his doom a black arrow came flying swiftly through the air and struck the goblin neatly in the eye. He dropped to the floor, dead as can be, and this unexpected attack caused quite a commotion among the dwarves and goblins both, and for a few minutes everything was very confused, with a lot of shouting and running around in circles.

Sometime during all of this, someone — perhaps Dori, perhaps Gloín — stumbled hard into Bilbo, and he quite lost his balance and fell into the wall, where he hit his head so hard on a stone that he blacked out, and knew nothing more for a long while.

When he came to, everyone was gone, all the goblins and all the dwarves, and so Bilbo crept around in the dark for a while and had a mighty adventure all on his own, wherein he found a golden ring and met a very nasty creature named Gollum and won a riddle contest and escaped with his life and the ring both. And through all of this he could not help but worry about the dwarves, for he had no way of knowing if they had escaped the goblins or not, and if not, how he could save them, and if so, how he would ever find them again!

But then Gollum himself led him to the door out of the mountain — though of course, Gollum did not know it and certainly would not have led him there on purpose — and Bilbo slipped on his magic ring — for such it was — and, invisible, slipped out of the door right under the noses of the three very ugly goblins guarding it.

Luck was with him then, for very soon thereafter he found the dwarves, who were in quite a state and were being yelled at most severely by Gandalf for having lost their burglar. So everyone was quite pleased when Bilbo appeared, and they listened with amazement to his tale of how he had escaped, though he left out the part about the magic ring — though why he did so, he couldn't say, and if he had thought about it he might have worried why he omitted such an important detail.

But now they were in a fine mess, for they had no food nor supplies nor ponies, and several of them were bruised and scraped and needed tending, and they were still far too close to the goblins for comfort. So they began walking, though they were all hungry and irritable, and Thorin seemed to be in a fouler mood than usual. It did not take long for Bilbo to realize something was very wrong, for all the dwarves seemed anxious and kept casting sneaky glances at Thorin and then at Kili, who himself looked the most anxious of all, and walked with his shoulders hunched as if he was expecting a blow.

And perhaps he was, Bilbo thought gloomily, for certainly they had had the worst spot of bad luck by taking shelter in a goblin cave, and even a clear-thinking hobbit could see how the blame for that could be laid at Kili's feet, for it had been he who had found the cave in the first place. And Fili too, of course, but Bilbo knew enough of the dwarves to know that it would be poor Kili who would bear the brunt of it, and this made him terribly sad, and fearful too, for with each step he was certain they were growing closer to some terrible punishment for Kili.

But Thorin, it seemed, was more concerned with escaping the goblins than punishing Kili, for he kept them walking at the very fastest pace they could manage, and would not even let them stop for a few moments to catch their breath. They finally stopped for the night near a stream, and each ate a few berries for dinner, which was hardly anything at all but the best they could do. Thorin forbade them from lighting a fire in case the goblins were still looking for them, so all in all it was a cold and miserable evening indeed, and all the dwarves were very hungry and cross and no one slept well at all.

They rose at first light, and there was much grumbling and groaning as their aches and pains and bumps and bruises made themselves known, and of course they were all very hungry, for they had lost several days under the mountains and they had not really eaten since their dinner in the cursed cave. Oín would not let them leave until he had examined all their cuts and scrapes and cleaned them as well as could be, for without his bag he had no way to treat infection, should it arise.

Then Thorin said, "Kili," and all the other dwarves got very quiet. Moving slowly, Kili knelt before his _shemor_, and there was real fear on his face, which made Bilbo very anxious and scared himself. For he remembered how Thorin had punished Kili after the pony ran into the river, and how Kili had offered himself up to be punished just a few days later, and neither of those times was Kili scared in the slightest. Bilbo felt himself go tense as if preparing for a fight, and for one delirious moment he imagined himself pulling out his dagger and jumping between the two dwarves, as if that would accomplish anything except making Thorin even angrier. Gandalf had also gone very stiff and still, and though his expression was inscrutable under his great big hat, he stared at Thorin very intently and Bilbo fancied the wizard's thoughts were not so far removed from his own.

But "Show me," was all Thorin said. Kili breathed in very deeply, shaking, and then he reached into his coat and pulled out the bow the elves had given him — the bow, Bilbo realized, that he had used to shoot the goblin who had attacked Ori, firing an arrow he must have picked up from the ground. And it seemed to Bilbo that it should have been a good thing that Kili had the bow on hand to save Ori's life, but the grim set to Thorin's mouth and the fear in Kili's eyes made it clear that it was not.

Thorin took the bow without comment and stared at it silently, turning it over and over in his hands. Then, with clever, nimble fingers, he began to unfold it, and in seconds he held a full-sized bow in his hands, silver hardware gleaming in the early morning light, the carved wood burnished and shining. His fingers traced the etching in the silver and he held it to the light, peering closely at something Bilbo couldn't see, and he murmured, "Regrin. _Nashak Durin_." The other dwarves all muttered to each other, and Bilbo fancied he was not imagining it that the temperature dropped by several degrees. Even Gandalf looked taken aback and uneasy, though he said nothing, but sat chewing quietly on his unlit pipe.

"How came you by this?" Thorin asked. His voice was very, very calm.

Kili swallowed and curled his hands into fists, resting them on his thighs. "The elves," he said quietly, then cleared his throat and spoke up more loudly. "The elves in Rivendell gifted it to me."

Thorin scowled and spat something in the dwarf tongue, no doubt very foul. "It has been in your possession for weeks, then."

Kili breaths were soft and rapid, and it seemed to take a long time for him to answer. "Yes."

Thorin's frown was terrible, though Bilbo was not certain whether his displeasure was greater at the elves for giving Kili the bow, or at Kili for accepting it and keeping it secret. When he finally spoke, his voice was frigid. "The elves I can understand," he said. "They made no secret of their distaste for our ways. But from you I have would have expected better. You know our laws–"

"I know our laws," Kili agreed bitterly. "I _live_ them."

"This bow," Thorin said, slowly and through clenched teeth, "is meant for those of the Durin's blood."

"As I am," Kili said, something dark and dangerous flashing in his eyes. "_She_ was, so I am. And it has never been aught but a curse."

Thorin lashed out with his fist, striking hard, and Kili flew backward, blood streaming from a cut on his cheek. "Mind your tongue, _nidoy,"_ Thorin grated. Blood stained his knuckles and his face was very grim. He took a few breaths, staring down at Kili, who stared silently back, all defiance gone. He looked limp and shattered, as if his very life were draining with the blood that was pooling slowly under his cheek. "If you wanted to keep it," Thorin said finally, "you should have asked."

"You would have said no. You know the law as well as I do, _shemor_."

"You should have asked," Thorin repeated stonily, and the two dwarves stared at each other in troubled silence. The rest of the company was silent and immobile, as if no one dared to breathe. Bilbo felt for these few moments that the only creatures alive in the world were Thorin and Kili, _shemor _and _khufud_, and everyone else had simply ceased to exist.

After a very long, uncomfortable period which seemed to Bilbo to extend several hours but was probably only a few minutes, Thorin flexed his knuckles, the blood on them gleaming dully in the weak sunlight. "The law says you are to be punished for our recent misfortune and as well for taking a weapon which I had not granted to you, and so you have been." Then he raised his head and cleared his expression, wiping it of anger as if it had never been there in the first place. "The morning grows late. We must move on, if we are to find food and avoid the goblins."

The dwarves shuffled about, muttering very quietly to themselves and circling neatly around Kili, who had pulled himself up to a sitting position and touched his fingers gingerly to the cut on his cheek. The blood was already clotting, and in truth Kili did not look so much the worse for wear than the other dwarves with their own cuts and scrapes. Bilbo knelt down by Kili's side, forcing a half-hearted smile on his face, though he felt very little like smiling. "I do not think it will scar," he said. "It is long, but shallow."

Kili nodded and drew in a few shuddering breaths. "Then I suppose there is some mercy in this world after all, Mr. Baggins." But he looked tired and sad, and kept glancing unhappily at Thorin's back. Bilbo felt largely relieved that the punishment had been but a single blow, for his imaginings had been much worse, but at the same time, he imagined that Kili would have suffered a harsher beating far easier than what had actually transpired. Firework secrets, Bilbo thought sadly, and heaved a deep and heavy sigh.

They fell to the back of the line of the slowly moving dwarves, Bilbo being in no mood to share stories with anyone, and, in fact, rather wishing he had never come along on the quest in the first place, though of course if Bilbo had stayed home poor Kili would be no better off; it was just Bilbo who would have felt better for never having known such customs as _khazd khuv_ existed in the world. Gandalf came to them and examined Kili's cheek with a grave expression, then whispered a few words, after which it seemed to Bilbo that right away the cut began to look better, as if it was already beginning to heal, and all the blood that was on Kili's cheek vanished. And even after that Gandalf stayed by their sides, and though he said not a word as they walked, he took to patting Kili on the shoulder every once in a while, and Bilbo thought he looked very sorrowful.

All in all it was a very sour morning for the entire company, and they never did become any more cheerful than when they woke. But at one point, when they stopped by a stream to wash off some grime and take a drink, Ori came over and stood close by Kili, and he looked very upset indeed, twisting a grubby handkerchief around and between his fingers. Kili looked at him a little apprehensively, for it was rare indeed that any of the dwarves would speak to him — in fact, Bilbo could only remember Thorin and Fili ever addressing him directly, except when he had been ill and then Oín had shouted at him rather a lot to drink his tea — but Ori stood there full of determination, though it seemed to take some effort before he could work up the nerve to speak.

"I'm very grateful," Ori finally said, after shooting a nervous glance at the other dwarves, though only his own brothers seemed to be watching. "I'm sorry I never said. But you saved my life, and I'm sorry you got punished for it."

Kili frowned a little bit and glanced for some reason at Bilbo and Gandalf, who did nothing but smile encouragingly — at least, Bilbo hoped he did, and Gandalf's expression was inscrutable, though not unpleasant. "I didn't get punished for saving you," Kili said finally. He would not meet Ori's eyes, but Bilbo still felt it was a victory that Kili was speaking to him at all. "I got punished for having kept the bow." And for all the other trouble with the goblins, Bilbo thought, though of course he did not say it, for that was understood by all of them.

"Well," Ori said, and his voice grew suddenly firm, as if he had overcome whatever hesitation he had been feeling. "That's as may be, but the fact remains that if you hadn't had the bow, I should certainly have ended up a snack for the goblins. So I say again that I am grateful to you, Master Kili, and I hope that someday in the future I can repay you this great debt."

Kili nodded dumbly, seemingly too astonished to speak, and Ori bowed politely and took his leave. Gandalf turned to Kili with a great big smile then, beaming as if he himself were the sun. "And thus the weather of the world begins to change," he said, quite cheerfully. "You see, Mr. Baggins! One never knows what wonders each day will bring." And he clapped them both on their shoulders and would not stop smiling the whole morning long.

* * *

A/N:

I hope you all feel a glimmer of hope breaking through ...

Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to leave a comment. Very often they make me think and edit and revise, and they always make me happy. :)


	9. Escaping goblins to be caught by wolves!

The rest of their day was hardly any better, though at least it was no worse. Well, not so very much worse. At the very least, Bilbo reflected, no one got punched in the face, and that was a very definite improvement over the morning. There, Gandalf's magic proved unexpectedly effective, for though he claimed to be no great healer, by the end of the day Kili's cheek bore but the faintest red line where Thorin had struck him.

Oh, how Bilbo wished Gandalf could put that magic to use to heal Bilbo himself! For his feet, tough as they were, were still more battered and sore than they had ever been in all his life. Surely no hobbit had ever spent so much time walking and running along the forest floor, stepping on rocks and twigs and the sharp thorns that lay scattered all about the ground. For the very first time Bilbo began to consider the wisdom of creatures that wore shoes, though of course he would not mention it to the dwarves, for their teasing would surely be merciless.

Gandalf and Thorin would not let them rest at all, so that even if they stumbled across a stream, those who stopped to drink had to run again to catch up to the others. Nor did they find anything to eat but the occasional berry, which was hardly enough for 13 starving dwarves, a hobbit, and a wizard. By the time the day neared its end, they had fallen into a sort of collective daze, lurching unsteadily forward, and none among them had breath or energy enough to speak.

Bilbo was at the last of the line of staggering dwarves, but Kili was steady at his side, and he was ever there with a helping hand whenever Bilbo would stumble or when he grew convinced he should surely collapse, his legs were so tired. "Can we not rest?" he asked, again and again, voice growing rather more plaintive each time, but Gandalf would only ever nod and say, "A bit further," as if he had not said that very thing a dozen times before.

As the sun began to set, they heard in the distance the most frightening sound of wolf howls, and though any such howls would be terrible, these were distorted and eerie, more horrible than Bilbo had ever imagined a wolf could sound. Gandalf scowled and muttered _wargs_ under his breath, which meant nothing to Bilbo but made all the dwarves go quite pale. "Hurry," they cried, one to the other, and rushed as fast as they could (which was not so very fast, at this point), pulling and pushing each other along as quick as they were able.

"To the trees!" Gandalf cried, when it became clear that they could not escape the howling wolves, and so into a small clearing and up the trees they scurried as best they could. But if dwarves are not natural climbers of trees, hobbits are even less so, never more happy than when their two hairy feet are planted firmly on the ground. In moments, the dwarves were all safely tucked away in the highest branches that could bear their weight, but Bilbo was left to scurry frantically from trunk to trunk, searching for a branch low enough to the ground for him to reach.

"You've left the burglar behind again," said Nori to Dori, looking down, and Dori was quite affronted, for he knew not when Bilbo had become his particular burden, just because they had been chained together in the goblin tunnels. But the wolves were chasing them into the clearing now, and in a moment there would be nothing of Bilbo left to bother about, for the wolves would make quick work of such a tasty plump morsel as a Shire-bred hobbit, even if he was now a bit worn and ragged about the edges.

"Quickly!" Fili said, dropping nimbly down a few branches, and hanging upside down from his knees like a child on a climbing frame. "Take my hands, Mr. Baggins!" Bilbo did, squeaking frantically, and Fili heaved and pulled, Kili bracing him from above, and with the two dwarves working together, Bilbo was delivered to the safety of the upper branches, and just in time too, for there was a wolf nipping at his heels. Up the tree and out of danger, Bilbo wrapped his arms firmly around the great girth of the trunk, pulling in shuddery breaths and shaking quite like a leaf.

"Are you quite all right?" Fili asked, looking sincerely concerned, but Bilbo could do nothing but nod, because his heart was pounding so fiercely that he could not draw breath to form a single word. "I must say," Fili commented, straddling the branch as comfortably as if it were a pony's saddle, "perhaps if you ate but three meals a day instead of seven, you might find it easier to climb trees."

"Well, I never-!" Bilbo began, quite offended, for it had been many months since he'd had even three meals a day plus a decent tea, but then Fili laughed and slapped him on the back, and Bilbo realized that he could speak again, and he was quite grateful for it too. Still, the sight of the many prowling wolves below made him very anxious. "Wolves cannot climb trees, can they?" he whispered nervously.

"They are wargs," Fili said. "Even so I do not believe they can climb trees, else they should surely have done so and we would have been eaten already."

This did not make Bilbo feel altogether very much better. "But what are wargs?" he asked.

"Wild wolves," Kili said, frowning.

Fili scoffed. "Wargs are to wolves what goblins are to elves," he said darkly. "Among the foulest creatures ever to walk Middle Earth. They care only for death and plunder."

"They are allies to the goblins," Kili added, voice low. "They may be hunting us at the goblins' behest."

Bilbo sighed very heavily, for it seemed their situation had not improved at all since they were chained up in Goblin Town. He said as much.

"I think perhaps it has gotten worse," Fili reasoned brightly, "for as much as I would dislike returning to the goblins, I must say that it would be preferable to being eaten alive by wolves."

Though Fili was grinning, Bilbo shivered fearfully and Kili, who was straddling the branch just a little farther out than Fili, gave an odd little cough. Fili twisted around to glance at him, and perhaps they shared some silent communication, for when Fili turned back to Bilbo, he had a peculiar stiff sort of smile on his face, as if he had plastered it on for Bilbo's benefit only. "We are quite safe up here, and the wargs will get bored and leave eventually, so there really is nothing to fear," he said, which was a blatant untruth, "unless, that is, you are afraid of heights, like Kili."

Behind him, Kili's eyes went momentarily wide with outrage before he could control his reaction, but Fili of course could not see, and continued on cheerfully. "When we were but dwarflings," he said, "no more than 25 or 30 years old, there was a grove of great oak trees upon the mountain above Ered Luin. You could climb twice the height of a house and look out upon the whole town. I once dared Kili to climb to the very top of the tallest tree."

Kili grunted noncommittally, his expression still somewhat sour.

"Well," Fili said, feet swinging, "of course I climbed with him, for you should never climb trees alone, but he made the mistake of looking to the ground, and grew tremendously scared, and would not climb down again no matter how I pleaded with him. We had to wait for Thorin to come home and get us. As I recall, it took quite some time. Do you remember, Kili?"

Kili was silent for a long moment, so long that Fili twisted around to face him, one eyebrow raised curiously.

"I remember," Kili said finally. And then he added, voice very careful, "I just remember it somewhat differently."

"Oh," Fili said carelessly. "Well, you were quite young, so perhaps your memory of it is muddled. But we never did go climbing trees again after that."

"No," Kili said, and he frowned briefly at Fili's back, though he did not look angry or upset, but rather simply pensive. Bilbo wondered what had truly happened that day (for he was certain the events did not occur precisely as Fili said), and wondered too if Kili would tell him, if he asked. He rather suspected not.

The wargs had been gathering at their feet all this while, and they were growling quite fiercely now, and jumping up to nip at the tree trunks, though the dwarves were high enough that they were in no immediate danger. Still, though the beasts could not climb trees, this was rather dreadfully frightening, at least to Bilbo. Fili sat and gazed at the wargs, then pulled out his dagger and stared at it somewhat ruefully. "What I would give," he said sadly, "for a good set of throwing knives. A dagger is precious little use up here."

Kili scoffed. "Two knives would do little against this pack."

"No," Fili said, "I suppose not." Then he shifted gracefully so that he was no longer straddling the branch, but sat sideways upon it. "That magic bow of yours would come in handy, though."

Kili's mouth tightened, and it took a little too long for him to answer. "It would. But it is not magic."

"No?" Fili looked skeptical. "You hit an orc in the eye. In the dark."

"I do not often miss," Kili said. "And it was not completely dark. And-" But then he fell silent, frowning silently at the wolves circling the trees.

"And?" Fili asked.

Though it was not a command, Kili answered instantly. Bilbo imagined he could disobey Fili no more easily than Thorin himself. "And had I missed, Ori would have been taken by the goblins and killed. I thought perhaps I had been given a chance to _save _a life. And though it would not change anything, still I thought maybe-" He sighed. "Well, it makes no difference now what I thought." He looked very sad and dejected, and Bilbo wished Kili were close enough to be patted comfortingly. For though there were no soothing words leaping to Bilbo's mind, he felt that a comforting pat could rarely go amiss.

Just then, the growls of the wargs took on a different quality, and Bilbo looked down and saw to his great surprise that some of the beasts were on fire! When Bilbo had not been paying attention, Gandalf had taken matters into his own hands and thought to scare the beasts away with the only weapon at his easy disposal. It was a valiant effort, and might have worked, but this particular wolf pack was indeed allied with the goblins and were in the forest that night specifically to meet them, and though the fire caused great distress among the wolves, it also served to draw the goblins directly to them. The goblins were not scared at all by the fire, but laughed and cheered and cleverly directed the flames so that they spread under the very trees wherein the dwarves were hiding.

"Oh!" cried Bilbo, as the flames began to climb up the trunk of the tree in which they were perched. "We shall not be eaten after all, but we shall be cooked to death! Oh! Oh!" He was very scared, for being burnt alive was sure to be worse than being eaten, and he could already feel the flames licking at his feet. Fili next to him had quite lost even the slightest hint of his good cheer, and Kili on Fili's other side had gone very, very pale, mute and horror-struck. He gripped Fili's arm and groaned, "It's my fault, all of this," and Fili muttered something back that almost sounded like, "Don't be stupid," (though Bilbo later decided it was just wishful thinking at what he thought was the end, and Fili had probably said something else entirely).

This was not at all how Bilbo had expected his adventure to end, never mind that the contract he had signed included a specific provision for death by incineration, but it had been hard to take that seriously when reading over the contract in a comfortable armchair in Bag-End; Bilbo now wished desperately he had taken a little more time to think it through, for surely no adventure that requires a detailed listing of the many ways in which one could die is an adventure that ought to be undertaken, no matter how thrilling it sounds.

But then, at the very last minute, just as all seemed lost, they escaped a horrible fiery death by the grace of the King of the Eagles and his kin, who had just happened to be passing by, and with whom Gandalf was acquainted. The eagles swooped down and swept them up and away, out of range of the howling, furious wargs and the cursing goblins, and soon enough the company were safe in the eagles' eyrie. They were bumped and bruised and wind-blown and shaking with fear from their rather precipitous journey in the talons of the eagles — though of course they had not been in any real danger at all, for the eagles had not saved them only to let them fall to their deaths — but they were far away and able to breathe easily for the first time in days.

Kili was very quiet that night, and would barely touch the food the eagles kindly provided for them, and nothing Bilbo could say to him would ease his dark mood. Even Fili tried to convince him to eat, going so far as to press food into his hand, but though Kili dutifully ate what Fili gave him, he would not take a bite more, and Fili rather thoughtfully declined to force him.

"He thinks it is all his doing," Bilbo said mournfully to Fili. "That he brought this bad luck on us all." He felt much closer to Fili now than ever before, having shared what he thought were the last few moments of his life with him.

Fili frowned and paused in his painstaking braiding of his hair, which had gotten rather wild over the past few days. "Thorin has not punished him," he said carefully. "And so it cannot be his fault."

"Thorin has not punished him _yet_," Bilbo said, a little sourly.

Fili nodded, but said, "Of course, it is Thorin's prerogative as _shemor_, but I do not think he will." He lowered his voice and tipped his head closer to Bilbo. "There are some things that are simply too big to punish for," he said. "To punish Kili properly for such as this would be to beat him to death. Thorin would never do such a thing."

"Well," Bilbo said, "that is certainly a relief." But looking at Kili, who sat off to the side, staring morosely into the dark night, Bilbo thought that even if Thorin were not to punish Kili, Kili would take the blame for it upon himself all the same.

* * *

A/N: This chapter more or less sprang into existence in the past couple of days, largely to my feeling that I was rushing things a bit too much. There is hand-waving, and there is condensing unforgivably. To any readers who commented that they wanted more Kili and Fili interaction, this one is for you. :)

Thank you as always for you comments and kudos! Comments especially make my day, make me think (you know who you are!), and will often make me revise and rewrite. I always try to answer comments (even if not immediately).

And though I always owe a huge debt of gratitude to my beta sapphiremuse, I owe her an _especially_ big debt this time, because I really asked for an unreasonable turnaround time and she very graciously granted it to me. xoxox.


	10. An Interesting Evening

The next morning, the eagles deposited them far away, on a large forbidding rock that Gandalf, quite peculiarly, called the Carrock. Flying on the back of an eagle is not so very much better than flying in the talons of an eagle, and not a single dwarf could claim steady legs when they were returned to solid ground, and certainly Bilbo felt he would prefer it if his feet never left the ground again except so far as they must for walking.

And though they were far away from the goblins and the wargs, they had no supplies and they were all dirty and scraped and Bombur had taken to moaning piteously of hunger again, which did not put the rest of the company in a very good mood. Their ill-humor was only made worse when Gandalf announced his intention to depart from them as soon as he had seen them to some sort of safety — at the very least a place where they could eat and replenish all the supplies which they had lost in the goblin caves under the Misty Mountains. Nothing they could say would change his mind, for he had business to attend to elsewhere in Middle Earth, and grew quite irritable with them when they suggested their quest was more important.

"Dwarves," he grumbled. "An ungrateful lot as there ever was! You well know I had never intended see you farther than over the mountains, and that I have now done. Continue to pester me, and I shall begin to regret that I did not leave you to the mercy of the goblins!" This was most certainly not true, but it did make the company hang their heads with shame and fall quiet.

Bilbo was still quite fretful at this news, for he had only ever agreed to come on this quest in the first place because Gandalf had convinced him to do so. In all their time on the road no one had bothered to let him know that Gandalf was planning to leave them halfway through, so he felt now a little bit as if he had been swindled. But he would not say so to Gandalf, nor to any of the dwarves, but kept his peace on the matter. In any event, his thoughts soon turned to his poor stomach, for breakfast in the eyrie had been nothing more than the scraps of what remained after dinner, which had been little enough, and in any event, even two full meals would not have begun to make up for all the very many meals he had missed since they first set out.

As they climbed down the great stone steps cut into the Carrock, Bilbo took an inventory of the number of meals he was short since leaving Bag-End, and the number of poor nights' sleep — including in those the nights he had been too afraid to sleep at all — and the number of times he had feared for life. It was a poor accounting indeed, and Bilbo bitterly regretted ever leaving the safety and warmth of his home, and blamed his Took side for all his misfortune, for surely no sensible Baggins would ever have undertaken such a mad adventure.

The dwarves trudged along with him, Thorin at the front, Kili at the back, and all the other dwarves in between, and they looked no happier with their thoughts than Bilbo was with his. Bilbo wondered then what it was that they were regretting having left behind, for nothing they had said since he met them led him to believe they had homes as cozy and comfortable as Bag-End, even if what was cozy and comfortable to a dwarf was not that same as it was to a hobbit. Then he wondered — there was quite a lot of time for wondering, as no one felt in the least bit like talking — what had made them all venture on this quest in the first place.

Why Thorin had come, he knew, and he supposed reclaiming one's throne might be reason enough even for a sensible hobbit, and Kili of course must go if Thorin did, for Thorin could not abdicate his responsibility as _shemor_; perhaps even Fili had no choice, since he was Thorin's nephew and a prince in his own right. But the reasoning of the others, he didn't know, and he felt he would be sorely disappointed if it was only to reclaim the gold and jewels they had lost when the dragon came.

"You look quite thoughtful, Mr. Baggins," came Balin's voice at his ear.

Bilbo startled, for he had been so lost in thought he had not heard the older dwarf approaching. "Oh!" he said, quite flustered. "Yes, I was, I suppose."

"Perhaps that is fortunate," Balin said, somewhat amused. "Today's journey is none too pleasant. Were I a younger dwarf I could skip down these steps with ease, but as it is, my poor old knees are protesting each one."

Bilbo smiled just a bit. "I think your poor old knees are doing as well as can be expected, Mr. Balin. Even Fili and Kili are far from skipping." This was truth, for the lads in question were plodding along as wearily as the rest, though it also could not be denied that they were doing so with far less moaning and groaning.

"Ah, well," Balin said, "I think like as not they are humoring the rest of us. What, to youths such as them, is a night spent on the ground with no bedroll to soften the stone?"

Bilbo sighed. His own back was very much aching, and he was certainly not enjoying the huge stone steps that led down the Carrock any more than Balin. "This is, I will admit, the path my thoughts were treading," he said heavily."What I would not give for a few nights in one of the beds at Bag-End! Even the bed in the second guest room would do." He sighed. "I find I am missing my home rather dreadfully."

"It is a fine home, and you are quite right to miss it," said Balin. "I miss my own home, though it is rather smaller and much less grand than yours."

"Do you hail from the Blue Mountains as well?" Bilbo asked as they trudged along.

"Of late," Balin nodded. "We settled in Ered Luin when Thorin did, many years ago now. Family, you know," he said."It is better to stay together."

"Oh," Bilbo said, surprised that he had not known such a thing as this, after all these months together. "You are kin to Thorin?"

"Aye. Cousins, though distant now. We are closer kin to Oín and Gloín. And also distant kin to the Ris."

Bilbo found this quite interesting, as he had a poorly hidden though rarely indulged interest in genealogy, and had single-handedly penned his own family tree back five generations."I had wondered," he confessed, "what brought you all on a journey such as this. But it makes sense, if you are all family."

"Not quite. We are no relation to the Urs, though I suppose if you look back far enough, you are bound to find a common ancestor."

Bilbo frowned. "But the Urs are the least likely — that is to say, I would have thought they would not —" He trailed off quickly and uncomfortably, unable to think of a single way to speak his thoughts without being unforgivably insulting.

Balin raised an eyebrow. "You mean, why would dwarves so superstitious as they undertake a journey accompanied by a _khazd khuv_?"

"Well," Bilbo said, "I would not have put it quite like that."

Chuckling, Balin said, "No, you are far too dwarves speak more plainly, though we are often quicker to take offense, which is something of a poor combination." He smiled genially at Bilbo, who could not help but smile back. "As to why the Urs came along, I suppose you would have to ask them, but it is Bifur who makes the decisions for those three, and he is not one to be ruled by fear. In truth, I think he was simply in need of an excuse to swing his axe around, and this seemed a good opportunity. And make no mistake: my brother is every bit as superstitious as Bofur and no more comfortable around Kili, but he is here nonetheless."

Bilbo had of course noticed Dwalin's unease around Kili, but he was still startled to hear it spoken of so plainly. "And how is it then that you are so much more sensible?"

Balin sighed. "I fear I am not quite so sensible as you would wish, Mr. Baggins. Perhaps I am simply more discreet."

"No," Bilbo said. "I cannot credit that. You cannot believe this all this nonsense about bad luck."

Balin's mouth tightened, and Bilbo thought he had rather overstepped in the heat of the moment. But all Balin said was, "I wish I could tell you that dwarves were all as levelheaded as hobbits. But wishing for a thing does not make it so."

This was certainly true, and even Bilbo in his happy home in the Shire knew it. "What of Thorin?" he asked. "Does he believe it too?"

Balin was quiet and contemplative for a few moments. Then he spoke very slowly, as if the words themselves were shaping his very thoughts. "Thorin is bound by our traditions and customs more than any other dwarf. He does not have the freedom to disregard rules he does not like."

Bilbo would once have thought a king had precisely that freedom, but he had come to realize that the very opposite was true.

"But I would not presume to speak his mind for him," Balin continued. "The question of what he believes is one that only he can answer."

If that was true, then Bilbo imagined he would never know the truth, for he was not about to ask the question of Thorin! They spoke little after that, for Balin fell deep into his own thoughts, and Bilbo was loathe to intrude upon his solemn mood. Then, finally, they reached the bottom of the great staircase, and their walk grew much easier.

The company grew more cheerful then, though they were still hungry and tired. Fili and Bofur even struck up a light song, which soon had them all humming along. After several more hours of walking, Gandalf told them that they had reached the edge of the land belonging to a skinchanger named Beorn, who was sometimes a great big man and sometimes a great big bear. This was quite astounding, and Bilbo was very eager to meet this marvelous creature, though his excitement dimmed somewhat when Gandalf warned them that their reception was very likely to lukewarm, for Beorn had no love of guests and less love of dwarves.

Well, it took a bit of trickery on Gandalf's part to get them all safely to Beorn's house, but Gandalf was a very great wizard and a large part of wizardry is trickery, after all. So in the end, they were all gathered in Beorn's great hall, with themselves on one side of the locked doors, and all the scary things in the world on the other side, except for Beorn, who was quite scary himself, but grudgingly admired that they had rid the world of the Goblin King.

All was well until it came time for supper, for just as in Rivendell there was the problem of where Kili should sit, as there was only one rather large table. Bilbo thought perhaps the table was quite big enough that Kili could sit at one end, a respectable distance away from the others, but it seemed there were many more rules about _khazd khuv_ than he knew; what was permissible out on the road around a fire was quite impermissible at a proper table in a proper house, and though the dwarves hemmed and hawed and shuffled their feet in a rather embarrassed manner, Bilbo gathered that by all rights, Kili ought to eat his meal out in the barn.

This at least explained why Kili had never entered Bag-End on that oh-so-long-ago night, but stayed outside with the ponies the whole time, who had in truth been perfectly safe tied up as they were to Bilbo's fence, and had needed no minding. But as soon as Thorin suggested Kili eat in the barn — a suggestion to which Kili himself quickly agreed — Beorn's brows drew together in a fierce frown. A bear he might be, but he was no lumbering fool, and he knew more of the world than any of them, except perhaps save Gandalf. It became quickly apparent that Beorn was no more tolerant of dwarvish custom than the elves — in fact, he was rather _less_ tolerant, and would have none of it.

"Not in my house!" he roared, and he was so very angry Bilbo thought for certain he would toss them all out then and there. Nothing Thorin could say would appease him, and nothing Kili could say either, though he tried to explain that he was not in the least dissatisfied with the arrangement and in fact preferred it. Gandalf did not even bother trying to explain or intervene, but sat in a large and comfortable chair smoking his pipe, watching the fuss from under his heavy eyebrows and saying not a single word.

"I have but one room in this house for taking meals," Beorn growled, sounding very much like a bear indeed. "And I shall lay it out for supper for myself and the lad and anyone who will eat with us. Those who will not join us can take their meal in the barn themselves." For he would not leave them to starve, even if he was so thunderously angry with them, but certainly they had lost no small amount of the sympathy they had gained with him for slaying the Goblin King and many of his goblin kin.

Well, Bilbo was no dwarf, and he had no intention of eating in the smelly barn when the fire was so warm inside, and he said he would be very happy indeed to eat at the table with Kili. Beorn made a funny face at him; Bilbo supposed it was the sort of face someone might make if he was trying to smile after having forgotten how to. And Gandalf roused himself to say that he too would be happy to share a table with Kili, as he wished to speak with him about the elves in Rivendell, and Beorn should talk to him about archery, for it happened that Beorn himself was an accomplished archer, though he rarely had need for a weapon other than his own great claws and teeth.

Some of the other dwarves looked longingly at the table, already piled high with breads and cheeses and eggs and honey, but Thorin was stubborn and rigid and would not yield — though to his credit he did not look very happy about it at all; it seemed to Bilbo not for the first time that Thorin was wishing the laws that bound him were not quite so strict. Of course if Thorin would not yield, neither could Fili, and nor could Balin and Dwalin, who were ever reluctant to disagree with him in front of any other dwarf.

Thorin marched toward the door with his back tight and straight, and the other dwarves sadly began to follow, but then Ori stopped in his tracks and said, rather loudly, "Bother it! I have had enough of eating in cold, smelly, uncomfortable places. I think I shall stay inside after all, if it is quite all right with you, Master Kili?"

Kili, who had up to this point been looking very hunched and beleaguered and miserable, looked at Ori in astonishment, and did not answer until it became clear that Ori expected him to. Kili flicked his eyes quickly to Thorin, but Thorin did not speak, nor even turn around from where he stood. It was unclear to Bilbo whether this was any sort of answer at all, but then Kili said in a weird sort of whisper, "If that is what you wish," which was more than he usually said to any of the other dwarves except Thorin and Fili. Ori smiled widely at him and hopped up on a chair at the table and began serving himself some cheese.

And at this, Dori and Nori came bustling immediately over and said that they would certainly prefer the inside to the outside, if Kili was amenable, and they stood waiting politely until Kili nodded nervously at both of them, blinking rather wildly. Then they sat down, one on either side of Ori, which put Nori directly next to Kili, but Nori seemed unconcerned and even asked Kili to pass the clotted cream for his tea.

This was a fine how-do-you-do in Bilbo's opinion, and he wondered for a moment if any of the other dwarves should find their courage as did Ori and his brothers, but it was not to be on that night, though Bombur looked especially gloomy as he trudged out the door, and would not stop glancing behind at the well-stocked table, and Fili was scowling dreadfully at Thorin's back.

The next few moments were tense and awkward, and Kili in particular looked most unhappy with the arrangements, but the brothers Ri were quite determinedly merry. They began to eat with abandon and to hold a very loud argument over the merits of sweet butter over warm honey on bread, and would not stop until they had dragged everyone into their debate, even Gandalf and Beorn, who was quite firmly on the side of honey and would not be swayed.

During that dinner Kili would not speak more than one short, simple word at a time, but even so Bilbo was very much cheered by his entering the conversation at all — he admitted when pressed to preferring butter to honey — and Gandalf was positively giddy and would not stop beaming at Ori the whole night, as if he had done some very special wizardry of his own.

After they had all eaten as much food as they could possibly eat, which was in truth quite a lot, Beorn drew Kili aside. It seemed he had no extra swords at hand, but he did have quite a large collection of bows, and he proposed to give the company several along with as many arrows as he could spare, but as he did not know what kind of bow a dwarf might prefer, he was hoping perhaps that Kili could counsel him.

Away from the other dwarves, Kili was less anxious and more talkative, and if his conversation with Beorn could not be called lively, it at least was held up equally poorly on both ends. When they had settled on several bows, Kili rejecting some that seemed perfectly serviceable to Bilbo, and exclaiming over others that to Bilbo's eyes seemed identical to the rest, Beorn bid them goodnight, warning them sternly to stay inside the house behind the locked doors until morning, and told them that he was going to tell the same to the dwarves in the barn.

The brothers Ri were all by this point quite soundly asleep in a huddle, Dori's ferocious snores seeming to bother his brothers not one bit. Gandalf was settled into his chair, smoking again, though he blew no rings at all; the smoke did not seem of a mind to dissipate, and gathered in a cloud around his head growing steadily denser until only the tip of his hat and the tip of his nose could be seen.

Kili stood in the middle of the room, holding two of the blankets Beorn had left them as well as a big fluffy pillow; he was turning about in a circle, frowning, and Bilbo wondered if there were rules that dictated where he was to sleep, too. He suspected there were, for Kili had always laid his bedroll a certain number of paces away from the others, but in all honestly Bilbo had envied him his excuse for being slightly farther removed from the honks, snorts, and grunts that filled the air when the company slept!

Finally Kili dropped the blankets on the floor a very comfortable distance from the fire and the pile of Ri brothers, but he did not lie down immediately for sleep. Instead he took off his outer clothing, the elvish material still impeccable even after their rough flight from the goblins and through the woods, and sat down facing the fire, clad only in a fine linen shirt and breeches, staring intently at the licking flames as if hoping to divine some wisdom from them.

Bilbo was unable to draw any conversation from him at all except a half-hearted "rest well," and decided not to press the matter, for Kili appeared to be deep in thought and not at all inclined to speak to anyone, even a curious and friendly hobbit. His brow was furrowed and thoughtful, but he looked not so sad as he had the previous evening in the eagles' eyrie, and this Bilbo took to be a big improvement. Bilbo went back to the blankets then and selected two for himself, though they were so large he had to carry them but one at a time, and make a third trip for his pillow.

"An interesting evening, wouldn't you agree?" he heard when at last his bed was made.

He started, for the voice seemed to come from nowhere, but then he realized that indeed it had emerged from the cloud of smoke that was the head of Gandalf. "Good heavens," he said crossly, "do not scare me so. I cannot see you at all in that mess. You might as well have had your head chopped off by the goblins." This was perhaps a little more snappish than Gandalf deserved, but Bilbo was still upset at the wizard's impending departure, and it could also not be denied that the last few days had been very stressful and difficult for them all, and tempers were uniformly short.

The cloud of smoke chuckled, and then Bilbo heard a short burst of muttering. The smoke then obediently parted around Gandalf's face and made straight for the chimney, where it escaped quickly to the outside air. "Better?" Gandalf asked.

"Yes, much," Bilbo said, rather amazed that Gandalf's face and hat looked no dirtier at all, after having been submerged in the smoke for such a while. He looked then to the fire, where Kili sat still as stone, and said quietly, "It was an interesting evening for _me_. I think Kili may only have found it difficult."

"Difficult, indeed," Gandalf said. "To be confronted yet again with proof that the way he knows the world to be is not the same as others' understanding of it."

"You are unduly cheerful about it," Bilbo said. "For I begin to think that it is no mercy to him to be thus enlightened, if there is no hope that his circumstances will change."

"You surprise me, Mr. Baggins. For cannot you see that they have already begun to change?"

"I see that Thorin and Fili have taken their dinner in the barn, rather than break with their customs and share a table with a _khazd khuv_. I suspect it matters far less what Ori and his kin do."

"Oh," Gandalf said comfortably, "but there you and I must disagree, for I think it matters tremendously what Ori and his brothers do. Do not be so quick to dismiss their influence. They are of Durin's line, and as steeped in tradition as Thorin himself. And if they can change, Mr. Baggins, then there is certainly hope for the rest."

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A/N: This chapter fought me to the bitter end, and so it's a little later than I would have liked. On the other hand, it's longer, so I hope you will all forgive me.

Smooches to everyone who commented on the last chapter - I am now pondering rewrites to future chapters to work in some details about the tree incident (I know _exactly_ what happened there; my guess is you will all find out during the trek through Mirkwood). :)

xoxox to all who are still reading. You rock!


	11. Breakfast and Other Merrymaking

:: waves ::

Sorry for the long delay between chapters. :( It was an unhappy confluence of work and personal commitments, and the fact that I have known from the beginning that the chapter following Beorn's house was going to require major rewrites, yet procrastinated until I could procrastinate no more and then some. I finally finished up with some of major work deadlines late last week and sat down to rewrite - and all I accomplished was coming up with an entirely new chapter, which I believe enhances the story as a whole, but does nothing to solve my problems with the chapter following Beorn's house. Alas!

At any rate, enjoy the bonus chapter. :)

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The next morning, Bilbo slept very late, having accumulated so many missing hours of sleep since leaving Rivendell that, upon waking, he was surprised to find he had not slept the whole clock round. But he was evidently not the only one in need of sleep, for the Ri brothers still lay in a heap, deep in slumber, and Gandalf was also still abed, his hat perched over his face, the rim fluttering up with every exhale. Bilbo stood quietly and stretched, enjoying the sunbeams shining bright and cheery through the small window high in the ceiling. He felt very much refreshed for his good night's rest, and whistled merrily to himself as he entered Beorn's great hall for breakfast.

Though the day was tolerably warm, the fire was already built up, crackling and hissing softly and lending a cheerful and pleasant light to the room. Fili and Kili were there eating already, Kili sitting and working his way through a rather impressively well-stocked plate, Fili leaning against the table, holding his own even more impressive plate in one hand while he picked through it with the other.

"Why, Mr. Baggins," Fili said upon seeing him, "you look as chipper as I have ever seen you."

"And why not?" Bilbo replied. "The goblins and wargs are far behind us, and we are safe and warm here in this house. Why should I not be chipper?" Though there were in fact a great many reasons to fret, Bilbo was determined to let none of them bother him on this day, nor even so much as cross his mind.

"Come," Fili said, "sit and eat. Beorn has laid out a huge feast, and he is in the kitchen cooking even more." He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "Though Gandalf says he does not like guests, I rather suspect the opposite is true. For all that he was very cranky last night, he has cooked enough food for a party twice our size." He gestured to the table, a link of sausage in his hand. Bilbo kept his grimace at these ill manners to himself - after many months on the road, he had given up trying to instill proper table manners in any of the dwarves, and now spent his efforts on simply maintaining his own, which was not so easy as might be supposed when surrounded by dwarves who seemed not to know a knife had any purpose at a table other than to pick one's teeth.

After only a moment's pause, Bilbo sat next to Kili, who nodded politely at him, and served himself a full plate of the various meats and eggs and cheeses and breads that were heaped upon the many platters in easy reach. "Did you sleep well, Master Fili?" he said presently, when he had begun to put a small dent in his hunger. Kili and Fili were still rather intently focused on their plates.

"Well enough," Fili said with a shrug, rooting around his plate for another sausage that had gotten buried under a fried egg. "The night was pleasant, and the hay made a very soft bed, far better than the ground in the eyrie. But the barn did smell fiercely of horse, and poor Bombur rolled over into his sleep into a pile of dung, and is even now at the well attempting to wash the smell out."

"Well," Bilbo said primly, "none of you were forced to sleep in the barn."

"No," Fili said, "I suppose not. Believe me, I would far preferred to have been in the house with you. But there is only so far Thorin can be pushed, and some of the others are even less reasonable."

Kili frowned. "It is not unreasonable-" he began, but Fili rolled his eyes and reached past him for another strip of bacon, and Kili fell silent.

"I am just glad I woke first," Fili said cheerfully, mouth full of bacon. "For asleep, Thorin could not tell me not to take my breakfast in the house."

Kili frowned again.

"What?" Fili said, eyes wide and innocent. "I am doing nothing wrong. I am not sitting at the table with you." And it was quite true, he was very carefully not sitting, though if he leaned any further on his hip the distinction would have been entirely lost.

Now Kili scowled, looking quite disgruntled, though of course he would not say so to Fili, and Fili for his part seemed determined to ignore any and all displeasure cast in his direction. He continued his meal, picking at every bit of greasy food within his reach, and sucking happily on his fingers.

"You will make a mess of your fine clothing," Bilbo chided Fili, in a tone of voice that came out rather horrifyingly similar to his mother's.

Fili shrugged, apparently unconcerned, though he did then make a show of taking a napkin and wiping the worst of the grease off his fingers. "I shall wash after breakfast."

"The baths are very dwarvish," Kili said, rather unexpectedly, for he rarely volunteered an opinion without having been asked a question. "They are quite plain and simple. You should find them very suitable, Fili."

"Not like those fancy chambers of the elves?" Fili asked, a little darkly. "All those flowers and scents. As if I should want to stink myself up with perfume after just having washed! What is the point of that?"

"I suppose to some they might smell nice," Kili said, but he sounded doubtful, and Fili scoffed in agreement. Bilbo was frankly astonished by this, and also more than slightly embarrassed, for he had rather liberally applied the pretty perfumes of the elves during their days in Rivendell, and even thereafter, as the elves had generously gifted him with several bottles of his favorite scents. Those were lost now in the caverns of the goblins, of course, and Bilbo wondered briefly what use those horrible creatures might make of such fine fragrances.

Hoping his face was not too terribly red, Bilbo asked, "But he does have soap, I trust?" He wished very much for the answer to be yes, as he was rather covered in dirt and tree sap and eagle droppings. It was sadly true that the eagles' eyrie, while safe and free from wargs, was not so fastidiously maintained as a hobbit hole, and certainly the caves of the goblins had had no proper facilities. Bilbo had faced rather a difficult decision when he had woken whether to bathe or eat first, but the scent of the food had proved impossible to ignore, even though he suspected he smelled almost as pungent as the sausage, though hardly as appetizing!

"Oh yes," Kili said. "Soap and shampoo and whatever else you might need."

"Combs and razors too, I see," Bilbo said, for Kili's hair was neatly done, and his face was again as bare any hobbit's.

Fili's mouth quirked oddly at this, though he said nothing. Kili said, after only a moment, "Beorn left out combs and brushes of all sorts. But he did not have any razors. He was kind enough to lend me a suitable knife." He looked curiously at Bilbo. "I did not think hobbits needed to shave."

"Most do not," Bilbo said, "except for some of the Stoors. I thought only that some of the company might wish to, given the chance." Several of the dwarves' beards were looking to Bilbo's eyes rather tatty, though he was no great expert on beards.

Neither Kili nor Fili answered, but gazed at him peculiarly, as if he were behaving particularly odd and hobbity. Finally Kili said, rather slowly, "None of the others will shave, Mr. Baggins, though they might take the opportunity for a little grooming."

Bilbo felt suddenly very stupid, and heat flared in his cheeks, for though he knew little of dwarves but what he had learned on the road, it was clear to him now that Kili shaved not by choice, but because he was _khazd khuv_; whether this was law or custom, he knew not, but it hardly seemed to matter. "That is too bad," he said in a rush, "for to hobbit eyes, of course, a beard is no great attraction. Why, if you walked about in the Shire, Master Kili, the lasses would be all aflutter."

He meant it kindly, of course, as he meant almost everything he ever said, but Kili's mouth tightened so that Bilbo guessed it had not been a kindness at all.

After a moment of awkward silence, Fili grinned. "Did you hear that, Kili? You would have the hobbit lasses swooning at your feet. You must keep that in mind, should we ever run across any of them."

Kili grimaced and rose to his feet, picking up his plate and Fili's and Bilbo's as well. "I think I shall go help Beorn in the kitchen, if you will excuse me."

Fili nodded and Kili left, shoulders stiff.

"You should not tease him so," Bilbo chided, when Kili was out of earshot. "He cannot defend himself against you."

Fili turned to him, surprised. "Why, if you do not think he ought to be teased, you should not bring up shaving and hobbit lasses, Mr. Baggins."

"But that is different," Bilbo cried. "I did not mean anything by it!"

"That is as it may be," Fili said with a shrug. "But you could not have imagined he would be pleased to hear that he is attractive to hobbits." Bilbo was a bit abashed, as he had not really given it much consideration at all, but had in his desperate embarrassment blurted out the first thing that had come to mind.

"He would have a fine beard, you know," Fili continued, "if he were permitted to keep it. In truth, he can hardly shave fast enough. It is a bit of a pity, really, though I suppose it is something for him to look forward to when his sentence ends. In any event, I think a little teasing will do him no harm. He takes everything so very seriously."

"Why, you certainly cannot blame him for that," Bilbo said. "He has little choice. But do you not take it seriously as well?"

"Oh," Fili said, sighing, "I take it as seriously as I must."

This was hardly an answer in Bilbo's opinion. "I see that you are more comfortable around him than any of the others," he said. "Do you not then believe he brings bad luck?"

"Well," Fili said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully, "it is not a question I have ever asked myself, to be honest. Our tradition holds he does, and he believes it to be true. As for me, I suppose it matters little whether I believe it or not, for even if it is true, I am surely immune by this point. We did grow up in the same house, after all, and I dare say I have had more exposure to him than even Thorin." He threw a grin at Bilbo then, again full of cheer. "This is too much deep thought for such a bright day! Come, it is almost noon. Let us wake the others. By the time they are all up, I dare say we shall have enough room in our stomachs for one of your famous second breakfasts."

As it was nearly midday, the time for second breakfast had long since passed, and the meal they had just eaten would better be described as (late) elevenses or perhaps even early luncheon, but Bilbo was feeling pleasantly full and fat, and so he did not quibble. It did in fact take quite some time to rouse the others - Oín was so soundly asleep that only a link of sausage dangled over his nose was sufficient to wake him, and Bifur had to be picked up by his feet and shaken upside down (or so Fili and Bofur claimed, though they seemed unnecessarily jolly about it).

Bilbo did not see Beorn at all that day, for by the time he had finished luncheon (he had, it turned out, sufficient room in his belly for another meal), Beorn was nowhere to be seen. When Bilbo had stopped into the kitchen to greet their host he had found only Kili, elbow deep in suds, industriously working his way through an imposing heap of dishes. "No," Kili said, "he left almost directly after I came in." And, "No, he did not say when he would return." And then, "There is really no need, Mr. Baggins. I do not mind doing the washing up." But this last, Bilbo would not accept, and he rolled up his sleeves and found a clean towel, and they spent a very companionable time together putting the kitchen to order.

Gandalf too was not to be found that day; he disappeared as soon as he had finished his breakfast, and it was only their faith that he would not have left them for good without at least saying goodbye that kept them from despair. Without Beorn or Gandalf to tower over them, and with a seemingly endless supply of hearty food available, the dwarves spent a very merry and relaxing afternoon together, singing and telling tales and whittling new pipes to replace those lost to the goblins.

Kili passed most of his time outdoors, trying out the bows he and Beorn had chosen the night before, and by the end of the afternoon he had settled on a few as his favorites. Fili spent some of that time with Kili passing him arrows while heckling him amiably; Bilbo was pleased to see that Kili was rather skilled at ignoring his not-brother when it was just the two of them alone. With no back and forth, however, this game apparently grew dull and Fili eventually wandered away. Bilbo saw him soon thereafter speaking in low tones to Thorin, who scowled and shook his head quite firmly, to Fili's evident displeasure. But Fili soon grew cheerful again as he always did, and Bilbo found he could not fault him for being so young that his spirits could not stay long dampened.

Gandalf returned that night in time to share their dinner, which was quite informal after a day of commendable overindulgence. No one said a word about anyone eating in the barn, though Kili had taken his meal early with Bilbo and Ori and Nori, and if he excused himself before anyone else could be forced to sit with him, at least he seemed comfortable enough to eat with dwarf companions on either side, which Bilbo took for the great victory it was.

Beorn himself did not return until the next morning, and he was in fine spirits when he did, for he had proven to himself that the dwarves' story was true, and he had killed a goblin and warg besides. Though he was still cool to Thorin, he was warm enough to the rest, especially Oín, who had been sitting at the breakfast table across from Kili when Beorn had walked through the door.

"Killed the Great Goblin, killed the Great Goblin!" Beorn chuckled fiercely, and though Bilbo was not ordinarily the sort to take any sort of pleasure in the death of another living creature, he found he could not disapprove of Beorn's glee. Beorn was so pleased that he offered far more assistance to the dwarves than even Gandalf had dared to hope for. From his cellars Beorn brought up jars and pots of all sorts of practical food for traveling such as he could provide: dried fruits and nuts and cakes and grains, and skins as well for water, and even such things as soap and combs to keep themselves a little clean on the road. "I have already given you bows," he said, "and as many arrows as I can spare, and I shall lend you ponies to take you to the edge of Mirkwood, though I must ask you to return them ere you enter the forest, for I would not have them set even a single hoof in that foul place."

Well, this last did not ease any of their nerves, but still they were pleased to be so well-rested and well-fed and well-stocked for the next part of their journey. And when they left late that morning, each upon a friendly mount, Bilbo found that Ori soon forsook his brothers and fell back to ride with Kili, telling him a tale that Bilbo quickly recognized as a favorite children's story from the Shire. Kili said not a word, but listened very intently to the account, which in Ori's rendition was a good deal more violent and involved a stolen treasure of some sort. Perhaps it meant nothing, Bilbo thought, but that Ori had found for himself a new audience, one who would not dare interrupt his rather long-winded story telling, but when Bilbo looked back and saw the dwarves riding side by side, he could not help but feel very cheered, and whistled to himself a very merry tune.

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Feedback feeds the soul and the muse. This story is already better for all your thoughtful comments. Keep them coming! I adore them and you. :D

And thanks once again to my marvelous beta SapphireMusings for putting up with my unreasonable demands. Not sure what I did in my past lives to deserve you .. xoxoxo!


	12. Mirkwood

This chapter has finally been wrestled into submission, whew! Somewhere during all the battle, it tripled in size.

I do apologize for the delay, but work deadlines just refuse to up and disappear (alas) and we had to drop #1 son off for his freshman year at college. :: sniff :: So far the house is still standing, and #2 son and #3 son have not yet killed each other, so that is all good. I expect more regular updates will resume now that this very troublesome chapter is out of the way.

Fair warning: some of you are going to get very agitated. I do apologize. Bear with me a little longer.

* * *

It was several days of traveling to Mirkwood, and all in all Bilbo found their spirits were as high as could reasonably be expected, which was perhaps not so high as when they left Rivendell, but was certainly higher than when they had been captured by the goblins. It took but a day for them to fall back into their established patterns, so that to Kili again fell the burden of caring for the ponies and taking the second watch, and to Bombur fell responsibility for meals, and to Dwalin and Fili came the responsibility for keeping guard against wargs and goblins and other foul creatures (of which they thankfully saw none at all).

But though these habits reestablished themselves quickly, Bilbo also took note that new ones had formed: Ori had seemingly grown very fond of Kili's company, and he spent many hours spinning tales to him, with Bilbo frequently by their side, and Fili too when the mood took him, though he often could not restrain himself from interrupting Ori's storytelling with silly questions. And when the time for meals rolled around — far too infrequently, in Bilbo's opinion! — Bombur seemed to have forgotten that Kili was to get his meals last, and served him along with everyone else.

All these things Bilbo noted with a quiet sort of joy, and it made him happier still that Kili did not protest this new treatment. "Like as not," Gandalf said, "he does not think it is his place to protest." And though this was undoubtedly true, still it made Bilbo smile, especially because Thorin must have seen these behaviors too, and yet he made no move to stop any of it, and certainly it was most important what Kili and Thorin of all the dwarves could tolerate.

Too soon, though, they reached the edge of Mirkwood, and never had Bilbo seen a less inviting place, nor one he was less eager to enter. "Do we really have to go through?" groaned the hobbit.

"Yes you do!" said the wizard and there was really nothing for it, for though Mirkwood was assuredly dangerous, there were no safe paths to be found anywhere in this part of the world, and not even turning around again would gain them anything. The dwarves were no happier about entering the forest than Bilbo, and even less happy that the wizard was abandoning them to their fate. "Come come," Gandalf said to them all. "You knew there were to be dark and difficult parts to this quest. That is why I made sure to bring Mr. Baggins along to look after you!"

Well, Bilbo could not imagine what help he could be in a place such as Mirkwood, and would certainly rather not venture a single step within it, but his only other option appeared to be never to have left Bag-End in the first place, and he did not think even Gandalf could arrange for that.

"Very comforting you are to be sure," growled Thorin to Gandalf. He was in a very foul mood since all their attempts at convincing Gandalf to stay with them had failed. "If you won't come with us, you had better get off without any more talk!"

Gandalf just laughed at him, not altogether too meanly, and waved merrily as he turned his horse to the west and departed, calling a reminder to them to send back their ponies, and to take care, and to stay to the path in the forest, lest they lose their way and never be seen again. Well, the ponies they released as promised, though they were sad to do so, and not a little discomfited by the ponies' obvious great relief at heading away from the forest back to the safety of Beorn's house.

And then there was nothing for it but to shoulder their packs and enter the dark wood. All at once the mood of the Company grew very gloomy, as if all the good cheer they had accumulated over their few days of rest and easy travel had suddenly drained completely away. It did not help that Mirkwood was so very dark and foreboding, nor that Gandalf and the ponies had been so quick and happy to leave them behind, nor indeed that their packs were so very heavy — though to be fair, none was so bothered by this last concern as Bilbo.

They were very careful to follow the path as they had been warned by both Beorn and Gandalf, and not to let even so much as a foot stray off course, but as the path was not so very wide it meant that they could not walk more than two abreast. The forest itself seemed to forbid speech louder than a whisper. This meant that there was very little conversation, and what there was of it was hushed and fearful. For a friendly and cheerful hobbit the silence was hard to bear; though he sometimes liked to be alone with his thoughts as well as the next hobbit, his thoughts were not usually so dark and dreadful as the forest seemed to evoke.

Kili had been very subdued since they entered the forest, though on reflection Bilbo concluded that his somber mood preceded that day, going perhaps as far back as when Thorin had taken the bow. But having a new bow and well-stocked quiver did not seem to improve his mood altogether too much, though to Bilbo he seemed merely unusually thoughtful and not unhappy. In any event, he was in no great mood for conversation, but trudged quietly along at the back of the line. Ori, Bilbo's most frequent other conversationalist, was ever surrounded in front and rear by his overprotective brothers, and Bilbo was very loathe to intrude on that trio, for they spent their time walking either in absolute silence or speaking in intimate whispers.

Their meals, when they stopped to take them, were rushed and not very satisfying, though as their time in the forest dragged on, Bilbo found his appetite growing less and less — though not so diminished that he failed to notice their rations slowly dwindling. The dwarves took turns carrying the bows Beorn had gifted them, but it seemed to Bilbo that except for Kili they hardly knew what to do with them, except for Thorin and Dwalin, who were at least of middling accuracy. Most of their arrows were wasted on squirrels that proved inedible; the remaining stock they gathered together and placed in Kili's quiver where they would do the most good, though it seemed increasingly unlikely they would find anything edible for him to shoot.

The nights were worse than the days, for they feared to light a fire, and the darkness was complete but for the staring eyes that approached just to the border of the path. Though nothing ever ventured forth to attack them, the fear that something might made all their sleep restless, and they took watch only in twos, never alone, one dwarf always armed with a bow and Kili's arrows, the other clutching Orcrist tight in sweaty palms.

Even after the most careful rationing of supplies, they began to run out of food and water too, and still no end to the forest was in sight. Bilbo grew certain then that they had taken a wrong turn somewhere, though it was impossible that they should have, for there was but one path and they were always exceedingly careful not to get turned around. But there was no other explanation, he thought, for the wretched path to be so endless, and he could not imagine why Beorn and Gandalf had thought they could traverse the woods without starving to death.

And then their adventure grew more miserable still, though Bilbo would not have credited it before it happened, for they came to a river that they must cross, and oh, it was difficult to be so close to water and yet not able to drink a single mouthful or even rinse their faces. But Beorn and Gandalf had been very insistent that they could not touch so much as a drop of water that did not fall directly from the sky, and so the company steeled themselves and ventured across in a boat that was docked across the river and conveniently unattended (perhaps too conveniently unattended, but they were too desperate to question their luck in finding it). But then at the very end of this undertaking, Bombur fell in the river, and though they were able to get him out again, he soon fell so deeply asleep that they could not waken him.

And now they were in a fine fix, for they were weak and tired and dispirited and must also carry Bombur and his pack with them, which was none too easy, for even half-starved Bombur was still fatter than any reasonable creature ought to all took turns of course, but they were forced to move very slowly, and by the end of the first day carrying the slumbering dwarf, they had covered only half the distance they might have otherwise.

The mood of the company grew grimmer and grimmer, but Thorin seemed particularly grim, and Bilbo caught all the other dwarves giving him uneasy glances. "Do not fret so," Kili said in his ear, quite calmly. "It will be all right."

"It most certainly shall not!" Bilbo snapped, all of a sudden quite angry with Kili and Thorin and every foolish dwarf who had ever lived. "He is even now looking for something he might use as a switch!" And this was true, for Thorin had been picking up and discarding branches for the past hour, but only now had Bilbo come to reason why.

Kili shrugged. "He is only following our laws."

"Your laws," Bilbo said fiercely, "are silly and horrid. It is not your fault that hart came leaping out of nowhere, and it is not your fault Bombur is too fat and slow-footed to maintain his balance!"

"No," Kili said, with an unaccountable note of humor in his voice. "No one blames me for Bombur being fat and slow. We are not quite so irrational as that."

Bilbo threw up his arms, utterly exasperated. "I do not know how I am to sit idly by while he takes you off for a thrashing you do not deserve."

Kili walked along in silence for a little while, watching the ground in front of his feet, his brow furrowed in concentration. "You know Thorin is only as harsh as he must be," was what he finally said. "I have suffered far worse discomfort from cuts and bruises earned entirely innocently. And Thorin takes no pleasure in it. Sometimes I think it pains him more than me."

"It would not pain him or you at all," Bilbo said tartly, "if he did not do it."

Kili gave him a look that Bilbo supposed might be considered very gently reproachful. "That is an easy thing for a hobbit to say."

Well, Bilbo supposed this was true, but it did not make him feel any less indignant.

"Would you not endure a few hours discomfort, if it could reduce the company's anxiety and more?" Kili asked. "For even if you believe none of what we hold to be true, you must still acknowledge that any punishment Thorin deals to me will have the effect of reassuring the others, at least for a little while. Would you not take that on yourself, if you could?"

Now it was Bilbo's turn to be quiet and thoughtful, for Kili's words had a kind of calm logic to them that Bilbo could not easily argue against. "I might at that," he admitted at last. "But that would be different, for I would have the choice to accept it or not, and you will have no choice at all."

Kili frowned at this, and Bilbo did feel a little regretful, but that was soon washed away when they stopped for the evening and Thorin wordlessly motioned to Kili to come away with him. Kili cast a rather complicated glance at Bilbo as he slowly followed his _shemor_ up and around a bend in the path, and Bilbo grit his teeth in frustration and stomped as far away as he safely could in the opposite direction.

"Dwarves," he muttered under his breath. "Curse the whole dratted lot of them!"

His ill-temper lasted all night, even though Thorin brought Kili back very quickly, and Kili was hardly walking stiffly at all. Oín fussed at him a bit but Kili simply shook his head, then volunteered for the first and second watch. "I do not suppose I shall rest very well tonight," he said, "so I might as well make use of it." Bilbo noted with some satisfaction that at least the other dwarves had the grace to look uncomfortable, especially Ori, who was frowning so fiercely Bilbo was afraid his forehead would get stuck in a permanent crease.

"I shall sit with you," Fili said easily, who alone among the dwarves seemed as unperturbed as Kili, but Bilbo supposed that made sense, as Fili must have spent his life standing by while Kili was punished for things that had happened to go wrong in his vicinity. This thought made Bilbo upset all over again, and he placed his bedroll on the ground in quite a huff, and went to sleep without another word to anyone else.

His mood in the morning was no better, for he woke just as angry as when he had gone to sleep. It did not help that their breakfast was so poor that he had hardly started eating before he was already finished, and they had to restrict themselves to a single mouthful of water each. And still Bombur slept on, with no sign of waking at all, no matter how they poked and prodded at him. And still the path in front of them seemed dark and endless! All in all, Bilbo was in perhaps the foulest mood of his life and was irritable and snappish when anyone dared speak to him, so the dwarves wisely left him alone for the whole of that day.

Another week passed in this dreary manner, and they had very nearly run entirely out of food, though they had shrunk their rations to just a few bites at a time. Bilbo would have thought they had walked themselves out of Middle Earth entirely, into a land where nothing lived nor breathed, but for the occasional eerie noise in the distance that sounded almost like laughter. What manner of creatures could laugh in such a place, they could not guess.

"Is there no end to this accursed forest?" Thorin finally said. "Somebody must climb a tree and see if he can get his head above the roof and have a look around."

Well, the trees were oaks and very tall, and none were eager to risk the climb, so of course it fell to Kili, like every other undesirable task. At least the dwarves were cheerful and encouraging as he hoisted himself up into the lowest branches, and from there he clambered so quickly from bough to bough that he was lost to sight among the leaves in almost no time at all.

"Why," Bilbo said to Balin, who was standing close beside him, "I should certainly never have guessed that he ever had any fear of heights!"

Balin raised an eyebrow, seemingly quite astonished. "Why would you think he did?"

"Oh," Bilbo said. "Well. It was just that Fili said so."

Balin nodded and twisted his mouth in a very wry manner. "Fili said so, did he?"

"When they were dwarflings," Bilbo clarified, lest Balin think Fili had lied outright, since it was clear Kili presently had no fear of heights whatsoever. "Fili told of how he challenged Kili to climb a great tall tree, and Kili did, but then he climbed so high that he grew frightened and they had to wait for Thorin to come rescue them."

"Fili has a great talent for misremembering his misadventures," Balin said dryly. "The first and last parts of the story are quite true. Fili did challenge Kili to climb a very tall tree, and they did have to wait for Thorin to come rescue them."

"Oh," Bilbo said, "but Kili did not grow frightened?"

Balin's mouth twisted again, this time in a sort of a smile. "Kili would have spent his days leaping from treetop to treetop if he could. It was Fili who grew frightened when he realized how far up they were. Kili could have climbed up and down the tree a hundred times in the hours they waited for Thorin, but Fili would not let Kili leave him, and so up in the tree they both stayed."

Bilbo smiled, for the image of two dwarflings stuck in a tree was quite a humorous one, especially as he knew they got down safely and had been in no great danger, but then he thought of the probable outcome of the adventure, and his smile fell quite away. "Kili was punished for that, I suppose," he said sadly.

"They were both punished, as I recall. Sent to bed with no supper, amidst much whining and weeping." Balin chuckled. "Kili handled it much better than Fili, for all that he was younger."

"I suppose he had much more practice at being punished," Bilbo said. This came out a little sour, but Bilbo still felt he had shown restraint, for the words that had instantly sprung to mind were far less polite.

Balin's answer was slow in coming and very careful. "I would not lie to you and say he did not. But you should not think Thorin was indiscriminate in his judgment, or that Fili was given leeway where Kili was not. In fact, if I recall, Fili's punishment in this case was harsher, for he been the one to suggest they climb the tree, and he knew Kili would not refuse him."

"Could he have, if he'd wanted?" Bilbo wondered.

Balin considered this thoughtfully. "I do not think Kili would ever have disobeyed Thorin directly. But Fili was the only other dwarfling he knew, and I think — well, I think that there was very little Fili might have asked, that Kili would not have ventured."

"That," Bilbo said, "sounds quite dangerous!" For he knew the trouble even sensible hobbit children got up to, and he could only imagine what two young dwarflings might do, if one felt compelled always to accept the challenges put forth by the other.

"Perhaps it might have been, had Thorin not been so careful to keep an eye on both of them. He took his responsibility as uncle and _shemor_ very seriously."

Just at that moment, there rose a great clamor from the other dwarves, and but an instant later Kili slipped lithely down the tree trunk. Leaves were caught in his hair, he had an angry scratch along one cheek, and his expression was quite grave. "No," he said, in answer to some question from Thorin that Bilbo did not hear. "I did not see any way out. I could not see the edge of the forest at all. Only trees in every direction." He pulled a leaf out of his hair quite listlessly. "The forest goes on for ever and ever."

Needless to say, this news did not improve the dwarves' mood one whit, and they yelled and stamped their feet so furiously that the path beneath them seemed to tremble. Bilbo grew quite afraid then that Thorin would again punish Kili, but this fear, at least, was groundless; nothing new had happened but that they knew they must keep trodding along the same path they were already taking, and Thorin did not seem to feel this warranted any punishment, though it certainly made him even grimmer.

Bombur awoke the next day, without any memories of their journey at all, which was all at once scary and amusing. At least, Bilbo thought, they would no longer need to tote Bombur through the forest, and that was certainly an improvement. But they had now run completely out of food and water, and not a one of them thought it was at all funny when Bombur moaned piteously that they were all surely to starve to death.

What came next could hardly be called fortunate, but for the fact that they did not in fact end up dead from hunger and thirst. So in that sense, it was indeed good luck, but in every other sense it was very bad luck indeed. For they stumbled across some woodland elves who were not friendly, and then across some giant spiders who were less friendly still — Thorin was taken by the elves and the remainder of the dwarves by the spiders; only Bilbo remained free, and the dwarves would have ended up several delicious meals for the spiders, had Bilbo not found his courage to use his little blade and his magical ring to save them all.

Bilbo thought they deserved a little good fortune after all that, but it was not to be, for Mirkwood was never kind to strangers, and within another day they had all of them been captured by the elves, who were none too happy to see them again. But in truth, the dwarves were so very hungry and weak that they were quite glad to have been captured, for anything had to be better than wandering the forest endlessly until they dropped to their deaths one by one of hunger. Bilbo was quite as hungry and weak as the rest of them, but he still had the foresight to slip on his magic ring one more time, and so he alone was not taken, but secretly and carefully followed the line of blindfolded dwarves as they were led, stumbling, to the kingdom of the Silvan elves.

* * *

A/N: Still with me? I hope you are not too aggravated at Thorin. But as my marvelous beta SapphireMusings said, you can't expect dwarves to just get over their customs and traditions overnight. And some of you certainly suspected this was coming.

Shout out to my better half, who thinks this story is too sad but who agreed to start betaing for me anyway because no one is a better subject matter expert on The Hobbit than he is. (Huh, Beorn's a vegetarian, so he probably wouldn't have laden his table with sausages as he did in the last chapter, whoops; I should have wrangled hubby in a little earlier.)

Comments! Thank you for all the comments! This chapter would probably not have even existed in its present form if not for all your thoughtful words. I apologize if I am slow to respond - but I do respond eventually!


	13. Silent and sneaky

For all that he had signed a contract as a burglar, Bilbo felt that for most of the months they had been away, he had done very little burgling indeed. And in fact, even the little burgling he had managed had been accomplished with the help of Gollum's ring, which certainly no one could have expected in advance for him to come across; Bilbo did wonder what Gandalf could have been thinking, bringing a hobbit along on such a quest as this.

But in any event, Bilbo was certainly doing his fair share of burgling now, though admittedly it was mostly food and drink for himself, for although the elves were keeping the dwarves locked in cells, they were feeding them more than adequately, but of course they were not feeding any invisible hobbits! Bilbo was certain that if he revealed himself the elves would graciously feed him too, but certainly they would do so from the other side of a cell door. So Bilbo kept his ring on at all times and grew quite adept at sneaking cakes and breads and eggs out of the kitchen, and even wine and ale from the cellar, though any more than a few sips of those was enough to set his head spinning, and he grew quickly cautious of any elvish drink other than water. It would not serve him well, he reasoned, to let his head become muddled in such a place as this.

The elves had placed the dwarves in separate cells, far away from one another, and it took many days of careful sneaking around for Bilbo to locate all of them in the dungeons, and even longer to begin to learn his way well enough to get easily from one cell to another and another. But Kili he could not find, no matter how much sneaking he did, and as the days turned over one after the other, he began to grow quite concerned indeed, for he could not imagine what had happened to the thirteenth dwarf, but was certain it was nothing good, as the elves seemed to bear no love at all for their captives.

Bilbo revealed himself to the dwarves as soon as he had located Thorin (which took quite some time, as Thorin the elves had placed in the very deepest, darkest part of the dungeon). From then on Bilbo spent many an hour relaying messages back and forth between the dwarves, so much that by the end of each day, he was quite thoroughly exhausted from all the running around. The dwarves were all relieved to hear news of each other, but Bilbo felt he must admit to Thorin that Kili could not be found, and Thorin, to Bilbo's great relief, was almost as concerned about this as Bilbo himself.

"They would not have harmed him," Bilbo said in a rather hopeful tone. "He poses no threat."

"None of us pose any threat at present," Thorin said sourly. "Kili least of all."

Well, Bilbo did not believe that was quite true; Kili was young and hale — or as hale as any of them had been, before weeks of starvation had taken their toll — and certainly he was perfectly capable of defending himself in a fight. But perhaps Thorin meant nothing more than that Kili had been trained from birth to be obedient and subservient.

"I will continue to search for him," Bilbo said. "He must be here somewhere. It is only that I have not found him yet." For he had seen Kili caught along with all the other dwarves, so he must be somewhere within the palace, even if Bilbo had as of yet seen no trace of him.

Thorin thanked him gravely, frustrated at not being able to do more, but what more could be done from within a locked cell was beyond Bilbo. Thorin also extracted a promise from Bilbo that he would devise some manner of escape, but privately Bilbo was very doubtful he could accomplish this (as he was hardly the sneakiest of creatures). Anyway, he had no intention of implementing any such plan until all of their party was accounted for.

In the end it was sheer luck that Bilbo found Kili, but Bilbo had always been more lucky than most, at least he supposed he had until he set out on this cursed quest! And also, it happened that Kili was in fact within the palace after all. In truth, the elves were taking no great pains to hide him — it was simply that they were not holding him in the dungeons, and of course, they did not know Bilbo was looking for him so they were not so considerate as to lead Bilbo there directly.

How Bilbo came to find Kili was this: Bilbo spent the whole of one day outside the gates of the palace, hoping to find some way out of the forest, that being at least half the part of any plan to escape — the other being freeing the dwarves from their cells, but he was at last beginning to have ideas about how to accomplish that. It was true too that some little part of his heart hoped that he might find a hint of Kili's whereabouts outside the castle. Though it seemed on the face of it to be very unlikely, he was beginning to feel quite desperate since it had now been weeks since the dwarves were captured, with no sign of Kili at all.

On this particular day he found neither a way out of the forest nor any clue to Kili's whereabouts, and returned quite dejected to the palace on the heels of a hunting party; but when he crept to the kitchen later it was filled with elves merrily planning how they should carve and cook the hart they had brought down that day. It was altogether too crowded for even an invisible Bilbo to risk entering the kitchen himself, even though he had nothing to eat all day but a small, stale roll for breakfast.

It was a measure of how very much Bilbo had changed that he went to sleep with no dinner and only the slightest bit of grumbling about it in his own head, but by morning time he was so very hungry that he resolved to make straight for the kitchens and burgle some breakfast, no matter how many elves were present. But when he got to the kitchens, there were only two elves there: one with responsibility for the king's breakfast, and another dressed in the muted greens of the Forest Guard.

"I just don't see," the cook grumbled, "why we must make so much of an effort for a single dwarf bastard."

"He is no bastard," the guard said. She was tall and slender, as were all the elves Bilbo had ever seen, and quite lovely to his eyes. "He is _igthierion_."

"Oh," the cook said. "Well, then, that is tragic indeed."

"More even than that," the guard said. "To the dwarves it is a curse. He has been enslaved his entire life."

The cook looked intensely outraged. "A motherless babe is to be cherished and protected!" And at this, Bilbo's heart leapt, for certainly the elves could be speaking of none other than Kili, not unless there was another _khazd khuv_ dwarf in the elves' custody.

"So the Eldar believe," said the guard, "but the dwarves are not so civilized as we."

"Foul little creatures," the cook said with a frown. "Would that the king will send them on their way soon." He had been preparing a tray all this while, and it was stacked high with breakfast foods: rolls pulled straight from the oven, over which he had poured copious amounts of freshly churned butter, the bread still so hot that steam furled lazily upwards toward the ceiling; there was also warm porridge with apples and cinnamon, and a healthy portion of breakfast meats that Bilbo suspected were freshly carved from the previous day's catch. "Here," the cook said. He reached up to a shelf and pulled down a tray of pastries. "They seem to love these. The fat one in particular would eat them and nothing else. I hope the poor lad enjoys them half as well." He wrapped two of the pastries in a cloth napkin and added it to the pile of food.

"You are soft at heart," said the guard with a grin. "I will make sure he knows the pastries are a special gift." She lifted the tray then and nodded her goodbyes.

As soon as she left the room, and while the cook's back was turned, Bilbo in a flash grabbed two rolls and a link of sausage, then scurried silently into the corridor after the guard. Thank goodness she carried a breakfast tray, for otherwise the delightful fragrance wafting from the rolls and meat he carried would certainly have caught her attention for accompanying her down the hall; to be safe, Bilbo ate his pilfered meal quickly and quietly as he walked, grateful that the elf's pace was leisurely enough that he could follow her without running.

The path they followed from the kitchens led up and around and up some more. Weeks before, he would have found himself quite thoroughly lost, but by this point he had learned enough of the elvish manner of design to keep a sense of where he was going. And this was up into the palace proper, to his great surprise, and that in itself explained why he had never found Kili, for it had never occurred to him to look for a captive dwarf in such a grand place.

The guard stopped in front of a very plain door, unadorned but for some intricate carvings in the wood, and overall so ordinary that no hobbit would have been satisfied with it in his house. "Master Dwarf," the guard called, knocking lightly on the door. "I have brought your breakfast." Then, balancing the tray easily in one hand — which was a bit astounding to see, considering how heavily it was laden — she unlocked the door and opened it watchfully.

Bilbo half expected Kili to come barreling out, though he was not sure later why he should have expected this, even by half, for certainly if Kili had been likely to do such a thing, the guard would not have so casually opened the door. In any event, Kili did not come barreling out, and so Bilbo very, very cautiously followed the elf into the room. He noticed immediately that this room was much nicer than any of the cells in which the dwarves were imprisoned — in fact, though neither Bilbo nor Kili ever learned this, it had been the nursery for the king's son when he was a young elfling, and had Bilbo but known to look, he would have seen the scratch marks where the little prince had crudely carved his name into the wall with an arrow point.

The room was furnished with a very comfortable-looking bed covered with plush blankets and fluffy pillows. There was also a small table with a chair, and on the table were books and scrolls with titles in Common. There was even a full-sized bath, which Bilbo looked at quite longingly, for he had not had a proper wash since they left Beorn's house, and he was dirtier than he had ever been in his life. And also, to Bilbo's great surprise, there was a window, and though it was barred, the sun and sky could be seen through it.

Kili himself was sitting on the edge of the bed, and he looked healthy enough, his cheeks round and full of color. His clothes were clean and of elvish make, though they were not the ones he had been given in Rivendell, but they were of a similar cut and quality, and they fit him very well. His eyes tracked the guard as she set the tray down on the table, but he did not speak to her, although he did not seem very anxious or overly hostile, but simply silent.

"The cook has provided pastries," the guard said. "They are best eaten fresh. Your fat friend would be jealous, if he knew."

Kili did not respond, though Bilbo imagined he saw a glint of amusement flash in his eyes.

The guard did not seem to expect any reply, for she turned to look out the window. "It promises to be a fine day," she said. "If you are of a mind, you could accompany me on a walk in the afternoon."

At this, Kili frowned. "Your king grows ever more creative in his attempts to sway me. Pastries and an excursion in a single day."

"The pastries were the cook's idea," the elf said mildly. "And the walk is just a walk. A chance to stretch your legs and gaze upon something other than these four walls."

Kili's eyes flickered to the window, his gaze full of longing, but then he set his jaw and narrowed his eyes at the elf. "It matters not what you offer. I will not change my mind."

"As I said," the guard replied, her tone still airy and light, "it is just a walk. You need not come if you do not wish it. But there is no need to make a hasty decision. I will not in any event be leaving until the afternoon. Perhaps you will feel differently after lunch, when the sun warms the air."

"Perhaps," Kili said, though he did not sound at all as if he was wavering, and his jaw was set quite firmly.

The guard stood straight as if she was to leave, and Bilbo quickly darted out the open door, though he had considered briefly staying with Kili and perhaps sharing some of his enormous breakfast, for the rolls and meats he had stolen had hardly put a dent in his appetite. But all things considered, he felt certain it was safer to be on the other side of any locked door — that is to say, the side with the lock!

"Enjoy your breakfast, Master Dwarf," the elf said politely, and she took her leave, not noticing at all the little invisible hobbit flattened against the opposite wall of the hallway, holding his breath. Bilbo waited until she was safely gone before bending down to whisper in the keyhole. This he did with great care, for when he visited the dwarves in the deep dungeons, there was no risk of anyone coming except guards with great rings of noisily clanking keys, and so he was never very afraid of being discovered, but here in this wide and brightly lit corridor he felt very exposed and vulnerable, even with his magic ring, for it offered no protection at all against being overheard.

Kili was quite astonished to hear Bilbo's whispered voice, for it had been many weeks since they had been captured, and he admitted that he had begun to wonder if he had been quite left behind. "Though I thought it unlikely," he whispered back, "for if the Company had truly left, the elves would have no need to try to win me to their favor."

"Is that what they are trying to do?" Bilbo asked.

"They say many things to me," Kili said carelessly. "It is all the same as the elves in Rivendell, and Beorn too, I suppose. They tell me of my worth, and that I have been mistreated my entire life and I am just too thick to see it. Not that they use those very words, but that is what they mean."

Bilbo was quiet for a moment, for he had a horrible feeling that Kili lumped him in with the elves and all others who thought him stupid.

Kili did not wait for him to speak. "These elves have invited me to stay if I choose, if only I will tell them Thorin's purpose."

"But you have not," Bilbo said, alarmed, for Thorin was quite insistent that the dwarves breathe not a word of their quest to the elves.

"No," Kili said crossly. "Thorin hates the elves, and I am sure this captivity has not further endeared them to him. If he had told them himself, they would have no need to ask me, so I assumed he had not told them, and therefore I kept my own council."

"Well," Bilbo said, "Thorin will be very pleased to hear it, and also to hear that you are well, of course."

"I am well fed," Kili said, "and well bathed, and well rested, and well bored!"

"Not so bored as the rest of the Company," Bilbo said, "for at least the elves have given you something to read."

Kili grunted. "Yes, and I have never read so much in my entire life. You must thank Mr. Balin for me, as he was the one who taught me."

"I shall pass it on," Bilbo promised. "I am sure he shall be very pleased to hear that you are well enough to read, just as I am sure they will all be pleased that you have been found safe and sound. Everyone has been quite concerned."

This was perhaps a small stretching of the truth. Certainly Thorin was very concerned, and Fili was quite bothersome with his constant asking after Kili, and Ori too had taken to inquiring after Kili every time Bilbo came by his cell, as if it were possible that Bilbo might have accidentally stumbled across Kili and forgotten to mention it. But Bilbo was quite certain that none of the rest of the Company wished Kili any harm, even if they were less vocal in expressing their concern for him.

Kili made a noise that might have been mildly skeptical, but he did not otherwise contradict Bilbo's claim.

"And now I think I must leave," Bilbo said, "for Thorin is expecting me today and he will grow very anxious if I am late. Oh!" he cried then, though still in a whisper, for he had not spoken in any other manner for many days, "you should take the opportunity offered you to leave your cell, for perhaps your eyes will see something outside that mine have missed, and we may yet plan an escape."

Kili promised he would, and Bilbo took his leave with his heart far lighter than when he had woken in the morning.

* * *

A/N: A little bit lighter, this week, right? Next up - barrels. Because it wouldn't be The Hobbit without barrels! And also, Things Get Said.

Thanks as always to SapphireMusings for the beta, and to my dear hubby as well, who may find himself consigned to proofreading duty from now on.

Thanks also to everyone who takes the time to comment. Your thoughts and suggestions are always most appreciated!


	14. Escape

As promised, barrels. And also, Things Are Said.

* * *

Bilbo did not return to see Kili for two days, for he was very busy passing messages back and forth between the other dwarves, and their cells were quite a bit apart, so that it took a long time just to make the trip from one to another and back again, and of course he needed some time for himself to burgle food and eat it, and also to sleep. It was a wearying sort of way to live, and some days he felt he could not bear it any longer, but of course there was hardly much choice about that unless he could plan an escape.

When he did go back to see Kili, he followed the very same guard bringing another heavily laden breakfast tray, but this time, when she had exchanged morning pleasantries with Kili and left, Bilbo stayed behind in the cell. And though it made him a little nervous to hear the key twist in the lock behind him, the dwarf guard was to return at lunchtime, and a few hours in a locked room seemed bearable — the dwarves, after all, had been locked up for a full month, and seemed none the worse for it, though of course they were all very grumpy indeed.

"Mr. Baggins!" Kili said, when Bilbo had revealed himself. "Should you not be on the other side of the door?"

"I thought I should spend the morning with you, if that is all right," said Bilbo. He supposed it did not matter at this point whether it was all right or not, for now that the guard had left, there was nothing else for it but to stay. But Kili nodded and looked quite happy, or at least as happy as he ever did, which Bilbo could tell by a certain lightness in his eyes and the slightest of smiles on his lips.

"It is quite all right," Kili said. "You may share my breakfast, if you like." This was said shyly, but Bilbo was still very pleased that Kili himself had made the offer, even if Bilbo was no dwarf and thus exempt from all the rules that governed Kili's interactions with other dwarves.

"They certainly do give you a lot of food," Bilbo said. "I am surprised you are not as fat as Bombur by now!"

Kili made a peculiar noise then, and looked quite astonished at himself afterwards; Bilbo thought much later that this might have been the first time he had ever heard Kili laugh, and maybe even the first time Kili himself had heard it. "I do not eat all of it," Kili said. "I suppose they are so rich here that giving me two rolls when one would do just as well is of no import."

"Oh," Bilbo said, halting his hand as he reached for a roll, "but will they not be suspicious if you eat all your breakfast today, when usually you do not?"

"I can satisfy myself with just a bit of sausage and cheese, so you may eat your fill. The lunch will be quite as big again as the breakfast; you needn't fear that I will go hungry."

Bilbo was quite grateful to share Kili's breakfast, and though the food was no different than what he had become quite adept at stealing, it tasted all that much better for being shared with a friend. Bilbo was also delighted to leave his ring off for a while, for he had begun to fear just a little that if he left it on too long, he might disappear altogether and never be visible again.

They chatted lightly while they ate, though they kept their voices down to a whisper and a wary eye on the door, for it would not do to be caught unawares by a visit from a curious elf wondering at a two-sided conversation coming from a room with but one occupant. But even so it was still the most enjoyable few hours Bilbo spent during his entire stay within Mirkwood, and he felt very well-fed and warm and indeed, even briefly content.

Kili was quite keen to hear what little news Bilbo had to share about Thorin and Fili, and even eager to hear any news of the other dwarves, though there was really very little to discuss other than how grumpy each of them was, and Thorin in particular. "The elves do not let them out but to bathe," Bilbo said, "and then but once a week, and the dungeons are quite deep within the underground caves, so they cannot even see the sun."

"Dwarves are quite comfortable in caves, Mr. Baggins," Kili said. "And can live for months underground with no sight of the sky. But it is just as well the elves do not know this, for surely they think this captivity is far more oppressive than it truly is."

Bilbo agreed it was better for the elves to believe this, though he did not see how that helped them out of their predicament. And this thought then reminded him to ask if Kili had agreed to take a walk with the elf guard, and if so, if he had seen anything of interest that might help towards an escape.

Kili had indeed gone for the walk, though only because Bilbo had asked, but he did not think he had seen very much of interest, "though there is a river," he said, "which they use to trade with the men of Lake-Town, but it is always guarded, and I did not see any boats, just ferries that the men used to deliver barrels of wine and fruit," and he did not see how they could steal a ferry out under the noses of the men.

Bilbo agreed that even with his ring, he could not steal a ferry, for the ring would turn him invisible and anything he carried, but not things he merely touched. "But wait," he said, "did you say barrels?" For he had seen many barrels in the wine cellar, but had given no thought to where they came from and whence they went once they were empty. And now, finally, a germ of an idea was sprouting in his mind, and he began to grow quite excited, and could hardly wait for the guard to return so he could begin to determine if there was any merit at all to his plan.

He explained it to Kili — for he was so excited that he could not hide it, and Kili demanded to know what it was he was thinking about. Upon hearing Bilbo's idea, Kili was quite dubious, but had no better suggestions. "Though," he said, "I do not envy you having to convince Thorin." Bilbo did not envy himself this task either! But as this was the only real idea he had devised, he hoped Thorin would be sensible should it prove to be something they could carry out.

As it turned out, Thorin was none too keen on the idea at all, but Bilbo had determined it should work, and as he had not a single other suggestion for spiriting away 13 dwarves and a hobbit, he was unusually stubborn about it, and at last Thorin agreed.

And so it was a few nights later, when the elves were mostly occupied with one of their very frequent feasts, and Bilbo had the good fortune to find the butler and a guard in a drunken slumber, that he stole the dungeon keys and freed the dwarves, one after the other, and brought them to the cellar. He then scurried away as quickly as he could to the room where Kili was being kept, but then he encountered a problem, for the guard's keys did not work on Kili's door! Bilbo realized with some dismay that he had only ever seen the she-elf unlock Kili's door, and she was nowhere to be found, and he was not brave or foolhardy enough to sneak into the great feast and try to find her and her keys there.

He grew quite agitated then, for he was eager to be gone, but there was nothing to do for it but delay a little longer. So he rushed back to the cellar and uncorked Nori, who was very much surprised to be let out of his barrel so soon after he had been packed into it, and they hurried quickly back to Kili's cell. Nori was quite a good thief in his own right, quiet as any hobbit and an excellent lockpick, but the whole way there Bilbo fretted that they should surely be seen, and that would be the end of that.

Luck remained on their side, or perhaps it was simply that all the elves were at the feast, for they encountered not a single soul on their way. Nori picked the lock in less time than it took Bilbo to even wonder how it should be done. They then hustled Kili out as quickly as they could, though Nori did get a good look at the room and he exclaimed in amazement that Kili had been living very well, and it would be better if the other dwarves never heard of it, for their accommodations had been far less luxurious. Bilbo hissed furiously at him to be quiet, and they crept sneakily back to the cellar and were very relieved to find the elves there still asleep, the other dwarves all safely in their barrels, and the plan still alive.

One thing Bilbo had learned on this adventure was that every time he thought to himself, "Well, that was certainly the worst day I have ever lived," he was sure to live another that was even worse. And so it was that day, for the 24 hours that next followed proved to be quite the worst of Bilbo's life, even though he had been captured by goblins and nearly starved to death in the forest. But that trip down the river, clinging desperately to the outside of a barrel, was certainly the worst experience he had ever had. It made him feel no better that the dwarves had arguably had it worse, for at least Bilbo spent the intervening evening on dry land and managed to burgle a meal; the poor dwarves were stuck in their barrels the whole time and did not have even a single bite of food, plus they had been considerably tossed about within the barrels and all emerged very bumped and bruised and dazed.

Bilbo let Thorin out first, and it took the dwarf a very long time to even be barely civil to him, though in the end he acknowledged that as they were all safe and not permanently injured, he really had no cause to complain. Most of the other dwarves were not yet capable of coherent speech, but lay insensible on the shore of the lake, blinking up at the twinkling stars.

"Come," Bilbo said. "We should not stay here, for men or elves may wander by to see that their barrels are safe," and at this all the dwarves groaned, for they would happily have spent the rest of the night not moving at all. Reluctantly, they began to struggle to their feet, far more slowly than Bilbo would like, but Bofur explained that Bilbo was lucky any of them were moving at all, and Bilbo just must be patient.

But while the older dwarves were still shaking some sense into their heads, Kili staggered to his feet and stumbled over to Thorin, where he fell rather unsteadily to his knees. Bilbo groaned, though only in his mind, for he did not even want to consider what punishment might be deemed suitable for the month they had just lived, and no-one could argue that they had not had some very bad luck indeed — though they had some good luck, too, or they should not have escaped at all.

But Thorin just looked at Kili with bruised and tired eyes, and he said simply, "I believe those barrels were more than sufficient punishment for anyone."

Kili did not argue, and only frowned a little bit, but he stayed kneeling at Thorin's feet, and his eyes were dark and uneasy. Then he reached into his overcoat, the Elvish leather still pristine even after a day stuffed in a barrel, and pulled out the folding bow the elves of Rivendell had given him. At this, an excited murmuring ran through the dwarves, but Kili paid them no mind, and handed the bow to Thorin.

"The elves," he said, sounding troubled, "knew who I was. They knew _what_ I was. They tried to persuade me to forsake you. The king himself offered me a place within their halls, if I would but reveal your goals and foreswear my people."

Thorin frowned, but his eyes were unfocused and far away. "And did you tell them of our quest?" he asked, his voice very soft.

"No! I am no elf-friend," Kili said, looking quite offended. "I am a dwarf. My loyalty cannot be bought with soft beds, or rich foods and pretty trinkets."

"No," Thorin said. He held the bow loosely in his fingers, turning it around and around in his hands. "I am sure it cannot be. It is just-" And here he sighed, very wearily, "I would not blame you if you had. Certainly the elves have treated you with far more compassion than your own people."

Kili frowned quite fiercely at this, but he did not speak either to confirm or deny Thorin's statement.

Finally Thorin sighed again, a very long and heavy exhalation, and he reached out to place the bow gently back in Kili's hands. "This has come to you twice, and I should be a far bigger fool than I am if I were to ignore such a sign. Keep it, and we shall all hope that when the time comes that you must use it, your arrows will fly straight and true."

Kili looked quite dumbfounded and even a little overwhelmed, but he accepted the bow with trembling fingers and stayed kneeling at Thorin's feet until Thorin clapped him gently on the shoulder and said, "Our burglar is quite correct. It is not safe for us to remain here. Come, let us make our way to Esgaroth and see what sort of a welcome they can offer to the returned King Under the Mountain."

Without another word, Thorin started off, and the other dwarves followed with slow, shaky steps and not a few backward glances at Kili, who stood still with the bow gripped tight. Fili alone did not move forward, but stood in place gazing after Thorin with a speculative expression that he soon transferred to Kili. Of course, such a serious look could not last long on his face, and soon enough it turned into a brilliant smile.

"Come!" he said cheerfully to Kili, tugging on his arm. "Lake-Town awaits! You shall have plenty of time once we are safely within to play with your magic bow."

Kili stared at him blankly for just a moment, fingers clenching around the bow, but then a familiar scowl of irritation settled across his features. "I have told you already," he said, "it is not magic."

"Yes, yes, so you have said." Fili tugged on Kili's arm again to pull him forward, and the two fell into step with a natural, easy rhythm, with Bilbo trailing only a pace behind. "But I prefer to believe it is. It will make a more exciting story. Don't you agree, Mr. Baggins?"

"I think," Bilbo said, "that I have had quite as much excitement as I can handle for one adventure. I would be very happy if the rest of this journey was utterly boring."

Kili scoffed and Fili grinned, altogether too happily in Bilbo's opinion. "I do not think there is very much chance of that!" Rather gloomily, Bilbo was forced to concede that Fili was likely correct. But still, the immediate future looked much brighter than the immediate past, and so it was with a light heart that he followed the dwarves down the path that led to Lake-Town.

* * *

Extra special thanks this time to my beta SapphireMusings for helping me through a particularly tricky bit. And again to DH for reading and making me take out all the parts that were wrong (as well as a word he insisted Tolkien would never have used, alas).

Thanks to everyone who takes the time to drop a note - even the short ones make me very happy.


	15. Lake-Town

In which there is some more Talking, and Thorin is not a jerk.

* * *

The welcome to Lake-Town was grand indeed. Though the Master of the town was skeptical of Thorin's claims, the working men within were much more willing to believe the King Under the Mountain had returned — and happy too to overlook that it was actually the King's grandson who had returned — and raised such a hue and clamor that the Master could do nothing but welcome the Company with open arms. And so the dwarves were given a whole house to themselves in which to rest and recover, and all new clothing to replace their shabby traveling clothes; also they were feted with parties and feasts all day and all night, and songs of old that told of the glorious reclamation of Erebor, and the restoration of wealth and glory to Esgaroth itself.

Poor Bilbo appreciated this rather less than he might otherwise have, for he had developed a horrible cold from his ride down the river clinging to the outside of a barrel, and so enjoyed very little of the marvelous food the men provided, and was often too tired and achy to properly enjoy the music and dancing. But just to be at the parties was very cheerful, as no one was trying to kill them or capture them in even the slightest way. Even Kili attended the feasts, and Bilbo would often sit with him, and sometimes Ori would join them and he would occasionally be able to drag Kili into conversation, especially after a few mugs of ale had loosened everyone's tongue. Once even Bofur sat with them, and this was quite an occasion, for the Ur cousins were by far the most superstitious of the lot, and did not usually spend any more time with Kili than they must.

Thorin, of course, always had the seat of honor in the front of the room, and Fili as his heir usually sat beside him, though he often looked rather bored, and once even fell asleep in the middle of an especially long-winded speech, so that Thorin had to elbow him awake before anyone but the dwarves noticed.

Unfortunately, Bilbo's cold was very terrible, which he blamed upon the wretched month that preceded it and the lack of any brambleberry tea, and their third full day in Lake-Town he spent entirely in his bed, refusing to get up for anything at all except for occasional trips to the bathroom, and even those were made as briefly as possible and with much moaning and groaning for all his aches and his poor stuffed nose. The dwarves were as solicitous as they could be, which was hardly as solicitous as even the most hard-hearted hobbit, but they did pat him rather a lot when they saw him up and about, and murmured "there, there" as if that could help in any manner whatsoever.

There was to be yet another feast that night, but Bilbo had already declared that he would not go. And then there arose a great conundrum, for on this night the Master had bade Thorin attend him in his private chambers, and Fili as well. But the Master was perceptive and sly, and though none of the dwarves had said as much, he had quickly deduced that Kili's status was lesser than the rest, and would not deign to have him at his table, nor even in the same room.

Although the situation was in truth not at all funny, Bilbo did find just the slightest bit of amusement in Thorin's sour expression, for it seemed Thorin would not tolerate others treating Kili in the same manner he himself had treated Kili his whole life! After all, as Bilbo pointed out very helpfully, it was not so very long ago that Thorin had insisted that he could not take his meal inside Beorn's house if Kili were to be eating at the table there. "It is different," is all Thorin said to that. "They are men, not dwarves." Well, this seemed rather weak reasoning to Bilbo, as Beorn was no dwarf either, and a similar problem had confronted them with the elves in Rivendell. But Bilbo was of no great mind to point this out to Thorin, though he wondered whether the difference truly lay with the men, or with Thorin himself, who of late Bilbo had often found staring at Kili with hooded, troubled eyes.

"I can stay in the main hall with him," Fili very quickly volunteered, but Thorin would not permit it, for the Master had specifically requested to dine with the King and his heir, and Thorin was loath to displease him while they were so heavily reliant on his hospitality. But if neither Thorin nor Fili was there to act as _shemor_, then they must name another, and at this dissension rose, for none had ever played the part but Thorin and Fili — and Fili only twice — and none of the other dwarves was particularly keen on taking the burden.

In the midst of the argument, Kili whispered urgently in Fili's ear, and it emerged that he was none too eager to attend the feast at all if Thorin and Fili would not be there, for some of the men besides the Master had taken note of his status, and not all the looks they sent his way were friendly. Of course Kili's wishes were not so very heavily weighted, but Thorin was reluctant to send him if was truly averse to going, as there was nothing to be gained by it and much to be lost if an altercation arose and swords were drawn.

The past few days of plentiful food and rest had quite restored the dwarves' fire, and they argued loudly and extensively, except of course for Kili, who sat perched on the arm of the sofa and gnawed worriedly at his lip.

"For heaven's sake," Bilbo finally said crossly from where he was bundled up in a cozy chair by the fire, listening with increasing agitation to the very vigorous debate, "leave him here with me for the evening, and all of you go off and enjoy yourselves. Kili and I shall play cards and be quite content."

Well, that shut everyone up, and no mistake. Dwalin mumbled something, the only word of which Bilbo caught was "unsuitable" and Balin muttered something back that sounded like "unprecedented" but Thorin crossed his arms and stared at Bilbo very keenly.

"Well," he said finally, "you have certainly proved your worth to me these past few weeks, Mr. Baggins, and I have no doubt Kili would mind you well enough, but there is more to being _shemor_ than just sitting bundled in blankets."

"You shall only be gone for a few hours," Bilbo said. "How much more to it can there be?" Then a horrible thought crossed his mind. "You do not mean that I would be forced to–to punish him, do you? If he were to, err, transgress some rule?"

"No," Thorin said. "I would not burden you with that. But you would be required to report faithfully to me when I return, even if you do not like it or would prefer to keep it quiet."

"Well," said Bilbo, "as I am quite sure we will do nothing but stay here in this room, I do not think there shall be anything at all to keep quiet. I will accept the responsibility if you will grant it."

Thorin narrowed his eyes. "It is no light matter. If something happens, you must report it, even if you think it will lead to a punishment you consider undeserved."

Bilbo fell silent and considered this carefully, for while he was quite sure nothing untoward would happen, he could of course not guarantee it, and he did not know how he would feel about it if something _were_ to take place and he were compelled to report it. He glanced at Kili, but the young dwarf was no help at all; he simply sat staring at Bilbo frowning very slightly, though at what in particular, Bilbo could not be certain.

"I am willing to risk it," Bilbo said, "and hopefully nothing shall happen."

So it was decided, although Balin and Dwalin did mutter under their breath for several minutes before Thorin finally quelled them with a very stern glance. There was plenty of food in the kitchen, and Kili put together a reasonable supper for himself and Bilbo while the other dwarves prepared themselves for their feast. And then the house was very quiet, and it was just the two of them, eating quietly by the fire.

Kili was always livelier when the other dwarves were not around — if not exactly _lively_ — but this evening found him quite subdued and unusually deferential; his eyes were guarded and his speech quiet and careful. Bilbo found this an unwelcome change and could only hope it would last no longer than the evening. After quite a lot of convincing — Bilbo almost wanted to shake him and insist he was quite the same hobbit he had been in the morning! — Kili shared with him some stories of things he had seen when traveling with Thorin.

"A fire moon!" Bilbo gasped. "Really! Was it very lovely?"

"It was the prettiest thing you could imagine," said a third voice, as Fili unexpectedly dropped into the chair across from Bilbo. "It was so large and bright, it looked painted onto the sky."

"Why, what are you doing back so early, Master Fili?" Bilbo cried. "Surely the feast cannot have ended so soon."

"No," Fili agreed. "But we had finished with the meal and I thought perhaps you might wish to be relieved. Plus, they served an exquisitely prepared duck, and it seemed hardly fair that we should be enjoying it when you were here eating cold cutlets. I had them wrap some up for you, but it would not stay warm forever so I brought it back right away."

"You were bored," Kili said, quite unexpectedly direct, at least it seemed so to Bilbo, though he had noticed that Kili spoke more freely to Fili than any other dwarf.

"Just so," Fili agreed. "And worse. The Master is a simpering buffoon. If I should have had to listen to any more of his sycophantic whimpering, I might have pulled an axe on someone. He did not believe Thorin was who he claimed to be at first, you know, but now that he is convinced of the legitimacy of our claim, he cannot bow deep enough. Here." He slid a well-wrapped package across the small table, at the same time reaching for the deck of cards that lay upon it. "You should try the duck. It really was superb."

"Perhaps a little later," Bilbo said. "Though I fear it shall be wasted on me. With my nose so stuffed, every taste is dulled." He was quite sorry about it too, for the men of Lake-Town cooked well and their meals were hearty and filling, and similar to what could be gotten in the inns at Bree.

"As you wish," Fili said. He shuffled the deck of cards several times. "What is the game tonight?"

"We were to play Jacks in the Middens," Bilbo said.

"Ah," Fili said very cheerfully. "I could not be beaten at that game as a child."

A most peculiar look flashed across Kili's face, though he turned his eyes quickly down to the cards Fili dealt.

It was not fast enough. Fili stopped mid-deal and looked hard at Kili, who felt the stare and looked up. His neck flushed and he twitched uncomfortably.

"Kili," Fili said slowly. "Would you lose to me on purpose, when we were young?"

Kili swallowed, face tense and miserable, and though his mouth opened and shut a few times, he did not manage to answer. Bilbo felt briefly irritated with Fili, for even if he did not mean to be intimidating Kili, given the inequity of their station it was almost unavoidable, and he thought Fili should have come to realize it by now.

Fili sat back in his chair. "Well," he said, a little piqued. "That is a fine thing to learn after the fact." He scowled. "Then tonight you must play to win, both of you. I am no 40 year old dwarfling; I can tolerate losing."

Kili stared at him, frowning deeply, and to Bilbo, he appeared acutely conflicted.

Fili frowned as well, and he thought for a moment. "You shall accrue no punishment either way," he said carefully, "even if you feel you must throw the game. But I would prefer it if you did not."

Finally, after considerable thought, Kili nodded stiffly and Fili nodded as well, apparently satisfied at this acquiescence, and resumed dealing.

They played for quite a while, and it was a genial, pleasant enough game, as they were comfortably matched one against the other. Bilbo had always considered himself reasonably skilled in strategy, but he found he needed all his wits to compete against the other two, who played swiftly and fiercely, as if engaged in battle, and showed no mercy to each other or the poor sickly hobbit at their side.

Once, peeking over the tops of his cards, Bilbo found both Kili and Fili staring at their hands, deep in thought, and though he had never considered that they looked very much alike at all, at that moment they both wore identical scowls of concentration, and even were gnawing at their lips in the same manner. It was the first time he had ever seen the family resemblance so clearly writ upon their faces, but of course he could not remark upon it. That made him more than a little sad, and by the time he had recovered from his fit of melancholy, he had lost both that hand and the next as well.

The fire was very warm and Bilbo grew very sleepy staring at the cards; at some point, he heard a murmured, "I think he's fallen asleep," and he thought to protest that he had not, but he could not make his mouth work at all nor could he open his eyes.

"Should we move him to bed?"

That whisper came from Kili, Bilbo thought drowsily, and wasn't it just like Kili to be so thoughtful and considerate? Dear, sweet Kili.

"No," Fili said, also whispering. "He looks very comfortable. That chair is practically as big as a hobbit-sized bed anyway. Let him sleep. He has been so miserable of late. I wonder if all hobbits fare so poorly. Can you imagine, more than three days, and he is still ill!"

"He is hardy enough in other ways," Kili said. "I do not begrudge him a lingering cold, after all of this."

"No," Fili said. There was a rustling of sorts, and a brief silence, then he said, "You really should try the duck. It will be wasted otherwise, and it was quite spectacular. Do you remember Fregrid in the kitchen when we were young?" There was no answer, but Kili must have nodded or made some other silent sign of assent, for Fili continued, "She used to make duck just like this. And I know she would set some aside for you."

"She was very kind-hearted," Kili murmured. "I only understood as I grew older that she could have gotten in trouble for it. I did not realize you were aware of it. Did Thorin know as well?"

"Perhaps," Fili said. "There was little that went on in the house that he was truly unaware of. But it was a harmless enough transgression."

Kili did not answer, and Fili cleared his throat. "I brought some pastries back as well. I thought Bilbo might like them — they are very similar to the seedcakes he served us back in the Shire." Then he paused. "Oh. You might not have had any of those."

After a little bit of time, Kili said cautiously, "He shared one with me once, when we had been on the road for only a few days. I thought — at the time I thought he was quite peculiar, the way he would speak to me so directly."

"He _is_ peculiar to a dwarf. But I suppose for a hobbit, he might be very ordinary."

Had Bilbo been more awake, he would have suggested that other hobbits would certainly find him very peculiar, but not for speaking in friendship to Kili. But he was not very awake, so he stayed quiet instead, and eventually fell back into a doze, as Fili and Kili continued whispering to each other.

A creak of a chair brought him a little bit awake again, and by the muted sound of the fire, an hour or more had passed. He did not even try to open his eyes, so comfortable was he.

The dwarves were still speaking in whispers, though it sounded like they had fetched ale at some point, for Bilbo could just make out the occasional swallow and the soft thud of mugs being placed with care on the table. "Did you not resent me?" Fili asked, and even in a whisper, he sounded desperately curious. "How could you not? You must have known that I had everything that you would have, had my mother but lived."

Kili's answer was a very long time in coming. "I did not resent you. I knew no other life, and I did not ever think on how else things might have been, had she lived. And — I have always been told I should be grateful to Thorin and you as well, for taking me in; that in the olden days, they killed such babes."

Fili snorted, sounding just a little drunk. "You should have resented me," he said. "I resented you."

"I deserved it for killing your mother," Kili said, so quietly that Bilbo almost could not hear.

"I did not resent you for that," Fili said. "I was so young then, just a babe myself; I do not remember her at all."

"Then what?" Kili was the one sounding curious now, and Bilbo was curious too, and awake, though he feigned sleep. "You had everything — what could you possibly have wanted that I had?"

"Thorin's attention," Fili said. "You took so much of it. He would leave me all the time; you must recall that. With Balin and Dwalin, with Gloín, even sometimes with Dori! But you always accompanied him, wherever he traveled."

"He could not leave me unattended," Kili said. "And none would watch me, for fear of the bad luck I would bring. You were lucky to stay back in Ered Luin. I did not enjoy the traveling. The days were long and the road was hard. And — people would ever stare, when they found out what I was."

"Other dwarves were cruel to you," Fili said. "That I do recall. Did Thranduil truly offer to let you stay in Mirkwood?"

"Yes, if I would foreswear all loyalty to the dwarves."

"Why did you not?" Again, Fili sounded desperately curious, as if he could not imagine why Kili should have refused such an opportunity.

Kili's answer was again very long in coming. "I am a dwarf," he said finally. "Even if a cursed one. I do not belong with elves." He sighed. "Or perhaps I am just a coward."

"You are no coward," Fili said immediately. "I think perhaps you are very much braver than I ever considered."

"I do not think so," Kili said, but it was very quiet, and if Fili answered, Bilbo did not hear. Both dwarves fell silent then, and eventually, lulled by the soft pop and crackle of the logs burning low, Bilbo fell all the way back to sleep, and knew no more until the sun woke him in the morning.

* * *

A/N:

So, what did you think? Originally this was the first chapter where we really got to see any Kili and Fili interaction. I'm rather glad that all your comments (and the nudging of my beta) prompted me to include more before we ever got here.

Thank you as always for your kind and thoughtful comments! They really do help to make this story much better as I edit.

xoxox to my beta SapphireMusings and DH, who was very lenient with me this time.


	16. Desolation

In which not very much happens at all, except for some talking.

* * *

They stayed in Lake-Town for a full fortnight. After that it was still a week of travel to the Lonely Mountain, and the Company grew ever grimmer as they approached. The Desolation surrounding the mountain was complete, and it was hard to find joy enough to sing or laugh when all around was black and dead and dreary.

Each day that they traveled, Bilbo grew increasingly apprehensive, and the sight of the mountain looming in front of them did nothing to calm his nerves. He rode often with Ori, reminiscing of the few happy days they had spent in the library of Rivendell, and Ori told him of the grand libraries of Erebor. "Though I imagine Smaug has burned all the books to ashes," Ori said sadly, "but they say the shelves were carved of the most beautiful white marble, and those may have survived."

Other times, Bilbo rode with Kili, and to his delight, Fili would often join them. Though it was not exactly merry, it was at least comfortably companionable, and Fili and Kili shared very many stories of their youth. Bilbo found these tales of Ered Luin entrancing, and it was fascinating too to hear the differing viewpoints the two dwarves had of the same events — after all, they had grown up in the same house, though in very dissimilar circumstances. He was also very pleased that Kili and Fili seemed to grow easier and easier in each other's company, as they had on that quiet night in Lake-Town, though Kili was still deferential to Fili and there were topics they would not broach with each other.

When they finally reached the mountain, it was exactly as ominous as it had appeared, but frustrating as well, for look as they might, they could find no evidence of a secret door. And look, and look and look they did, for days and days, and all the time the end of autumn grew closer and closer. Bilbo and Fili and Kili looked the most, for the two young dwarves had the keenest eyes in the Company except for Bilbo himself, and also Fili and Kili were the spryest of the lot.

"What do you think Thorin shall do?" Fili asked one day when it was just the three of them, up on a ledge so high and thin and inaccessible, they had had to rope themselves together and climb one at a time just to reach it. Bilbo sincerely hoped they would not find the door there, for surely there was no way the rest of the company could reach it — certainly not Bombur nor Dori!

"What do we think Thorin shall do about what?" Bilbo asked sourly. It was quite windy on the ledge and he was not at all pleased to be there, scrambling over loose rocks, even with his hobbit feet to keep him steady.

"If we cannot get in," Fili said, as if it were the most obvious thing in all Middle Earth. "Durin's Day is nearly upon us."

Kili was slowly and methodically examining the rock wall; he looked over at Fili with a frown, but did not say anything.

"He shall have to give up," Fili said, answering his own question. "At least for this year. And as we cannot stay here for the winter, I suppose we shall have to return to Lake-Town. But certainly the Master will not host our Company for another full year — he was more than a little happy to see our backs. We shall have to work, or perhaps journey on to the Iron Hills to our kin."

Kili's eyes flashed up at this, while Bilbo gasped in dismay. "The Iron Hills! There is nothing in my contract about the Iron Hills."

"I suppose you could stay in Lake-Town," Fili said, though he sounded highly doubtful as to the wisdom of this plan. "Do you have any skills besides burglary? You will have to earn your keep until you can find someone to take you back to the Shire. Of course, you would need to pay for that."

Now, Bilbo was a Baggins and a Took besides, and the Baggins were a very respectable, hard-working family who invested their money wisely and carefully; the Tooks were great explorers, and Bilbo would not be the first of that line to return from an adventure toting gold — if he should survive and they were successful, of course. And what all of this meant was that Bilbo was a very well-to-do hobbit indeed who had never done a day's paid work in his life.

"I certainly have no idea how I should earn my keep," said Bilbo dejectedly. "Unless someone would pay me to blow smoke rings."

Kili snorted, and Fili cast him an amused glance. "Then we had better find the door," Fili said, "or you shall end up on the streets of Lake-Town, and we shall come back after the winter to find you shriveled and dirty and quite wasted away."

"Do not tease him so," Kili said absently, but then his eyes widened in alarm and he stiffened, all good humor quite suddenly gone. Bilbo stiffened too, for it was clear that Kili believed he had crossed some line, and while Bilbo didn't think Fili was in a position to mete out punishment, he certainly could — and probably was required to — tell Thorin.

But Fili just shrugged, very deliberately casual, and he said merely, "You are right. That was cruel. I apologize, Mr. Baggins." And then he turned back to the wall and started peering closely at the same rocks they had been examining for two hours, as if sheer force of will would divine some new secret from them.

Kili stayed stiff and still for a few more minutes, then he breathed deeply — if unsteadily — and turned his attention back to the rocks. But he was uneasy the rest of the afternoon, and his attention kept darting to Fili, who in turn was nearly manic in his good cheer, and would not let Kili finish a single sentence all the rest of the day.

They made their way back to camp just as the sun set, and Kili grew unhappier still, for Thorin asked for a report, and all Fili said was, "Same as yesterday. Rocks and more rocks, but no door." Then he very deliberately did not look at Kili, who stood to the side, looking tense and hunted, clenching and unclenching his fists.

Kili said not a word during dinner, which was hardly unusual, but he barely ate, which was unusual, especially after a day of climbing up and down the mountain. After dinner, he bolted to the ponies, though they needed no tending, for all they had done the whole day was stand around and eat the thin grass.

Bilbo approached very carefully. Kili was brushing the ponies' hair with very furious strokes, and his jaw was clenched hard enough that Bilbo's ached in sympathy. "I brought you half of my cake," Bilbo said cautiously. This was his custom, since Kili was not usually given dessert, but no one seemed to mind what Bilbo did with his share, and sometimes Bilbo thought that Bombur gave him the biggest cake of all on purpose.

Kili stood straight and still, and to his horror, Bilbo saw that he was trembling. "No thank you, Mr. Baggins," Kili said stiffly. "I have little appetite for sweets tonight." His grip on the brush was like steel.

"Come now, my lad," Bilbo said, very softly, though no one was close enough to hear. "It cannot be so bad as all that."

Kili muttered something under his breath and swiped viciously at the pony, who whinnied softly in protest.

"Kili–?"

Kili sighed. "Fili should have told Thorin. He should not have kept it quiet, what happened this afternoon."

"But — what you said, it was nothing. Certainly no reason to be punished."

"That is not Fili's decision to make," Kili said. "It is Thorin's. And you are wrong; I should not have spoken to him thus. It is just — it is hard. You confuse me, the way you speak to me, and Fili too, and even Ori now, and I forgot–"

Kili did not finish his sentence, but turned his attention back to the ponies, brushing with furious concentration.

Bilbo waited a little before prompting, "Forgot what?"

Kili frowned deeply. "That I cannot speak to them the way I speak to you. You are not a dwarf. Before this trip I would never — I have never been punished for speaking out of turn, not since I was very young. I always knew what I could and could not say. I learned it very early."

"But it was _nothing_," Bilbo said. He sounded a little desperate in own his estimation, but Kili was so very upset. "Fili didn't even care."

"He still should have told Thorin, and Thorin could have decided whether it was worth a punishment or not. Even if it was, it would not have been severe. Thorin is not cruel; he follows the letter of the law and no more. But now Fili has kept it secret when he should not, and so I must keep it secret too, and that is worse than the crime itself! But neither can I tell Thorin, when Fili has made it clear he does not want me to. He is not my _shemor_, but he is Thorin's heir, and I must obey him—" He grunted in frustration.

"Well," Bilbo said, quite unhappily. "That is certainly a mess." He chewed at his lip a little and twiddled his thumbs, neither of which inspired any great thoughts. So instead he said, "There is nothing for it tonight. Perhaps tomorrow you can ask Fili to tell Thorin. Unless you think he would be punished for withholding the truth?"

"No," Kili said, as if the idea was completely ridiculous.

"Then that shall be the plan," Bilbo said, "and there is no need to think more on it now. In the meantime, I think you should eat the cake I brought, for you ate little enough dinner and tomorrow will be another hard day of climbing."

After a pause, Kili accepted the cake, though he ate it without any great pleasure, and Bilbo suspected rather miserably that Kili had only taken it because he felt he could not refuse. This was of course the very last thing Bilbo wanted, for if there was anyone among the whole Company Kili ought to be able to refuse, it was Bilbo! Bilbo ate his half of the cake with an equal lack of enthusiasm, and took himself to bed very early.

He awoke feeling only a little better, for his sleep had been restless and filled with uneasy dreams. Kili had already set off for the day accompanied by Ori and Nori; Bilbo could just make them out on a distant rise, scuttling carefully over the rocks. Thorin had already set off with Balin and Dwalin, but Fili was still abed so Bilbo supposed no one had done any talking to anyone about anything.

This improved Bilbo's temper not at all, so he sat himself down next to a small creek and set about washing off the worst of the grit and grime. He had not bathed properly since they had left Lake-Town, and felt almost unconscionably filthy.

"Why, Mr. Baggins," came Fili's voice, "if you scowl any harder, you shall etch those lines permanently into your brow."

"Oh!" Bilbo said, in some surprise, for he had not heard Fili approach. "This dust is being quite stubborn, that is all." He scrubbed a little harder at his forearms, with disappointingly little effect.

"Hmm," is all Fili said. He sat himself down next to Bilbo, and ran his fingers idly through the cold water. "I should believe you, but that you have been frowning most fiercely since yesterday afternoon, and you are not the sort to let a little dirt bring your spirits so low."

"Actually, I am just that sort," said Bilbo primly, "and this is not a _little_ dirt."

"Hmm," Fili said again. He dribbled some water on his own forearm; it left tracks of deep brown where the dirt turned to mud, but Fili made no move to wipe the mess away. "And here I was quite convinced it was me you found so bothersome."

"I-" Bilbo began, but then stopped, for he could not argue that his frustration with the dirt was far less than his frustration with Fili and Kili and Thorin, and all dwarves by extension. "Well. I would not lie to you, Master Fili. I am a bit upset."

Fili nodded thoughtfully. "Some would say," he said, "that I am quite the most unheedful dwarf to ever live, that a mountain could crumble beside me and I would not notice unless I were hit by a falling boulder."

"Oh," said Bilbo. "I should not say that!"

"No, you are far too polite," Fili said with a grin. "But you must have thought so, if it took me 30 years to realize that Kili would throw a game of cards rather than have me lose."

"Well," Bilbo said. "You were very young."

"And he was very crafty," said Fili. "He would win a game here and there, you see, but never a match. I thought I won because I was older and cleverer."

"You did not think he lost because of the bad luck that came with being _khazd khuv_?"

"Perhaps," Fili conceded, "when I was younger, and did not know better." He dribbled a little more water on his arms, then sat in silence for a moment watching the muddy drops fall to the ground. "You think I ought to have told Thorin about what happened yesterday."

"I would not presume. I do not understand your customs well enough," Bilbo said, and indeed he did not. In truth, he felt he understood them less well as time went on! "Kili certainly thinks you should have."

"Yes," Fili said with a sigh. "He always does."

Always! Bilbo's mouth fell open and stayed open for several moments, until he closed it with a snap.

"Our laws bind _shemor_ and _khufud_ very tightly," Fili said. "But I am neither of those, and have more freedom than either." He looked sideways at Bilbo. "So I shall hold my tongue and Kili shall be angry at me for a little while; I would rather that than have him beaten for letting slip a few careless words. He knows his place more than well enough already. "

Bilbo could only nod in agreement, for this was certainly true.

"You see, I am not quite so blind as everyone thinks," Fili said, "nor quite so thoughtless." He rose to his feet and brushed off his trousers ineffectually. "I think I shall head to the rocks now, Mr. Baggins, before the sun rises any higher."

Bilbo stared after Fili, then returned to his washing, though he was quite distracted and sloppy, and left hardly any cleaner than he had been before. He remained distracted for the rest of that day, and was of hardly any help whatsoever, for he kept finding himself staring off into space until some dwarf or another would tap him on the shoulder to draw his attention back to the task at hand.

Then, miraculously, when the sun was starting to set and their spirits were setting with it, they stumbled across what was most certainly the secret door! Though they could not immediately devise any means of opening it, the company grew loud and boisterous and excited, and so they remained for another few days, until their failure to open the door made them all glum and irritable again. Thorin was in an especially foul temper, and the cousins Ur started muttering under their breath and casting superstitious looks in Kili's direction when they thought no one could see. "They think it's my fault," Kili said to Bilbo. "But I suppose Thorin does not, or I should already have been thrashed."

"I still do not see how they can believe you responsible for every little bit of bad luck that comes around," Bilbo said grumpily. It was late afternoon on Durin's Day, and everyone was in the lowest of low spirits.

"I don't think most of them have ever given it much thought," Kili said, in what to Bilbo appeared entirely too careless a manner. "Dwarves are not such a race of thinkers as hobbits. We are a busy folk."

Bilbo grunted — a loathsome habit he had picked up from the dwarves. He could just imagine Lobelia's scandalized look if he grunted in her presence! "Hobbits are busy too. It is just that we can manage to think and be busy at the same time."

"A mind at half-attention works only a quarter as well," Kili said. "Or so Mr. Balin would ever tell Fili, when he was thinking about his sword work whilst he should have been studying his runes."

"Daydreaming is not the same as thinking," Bilbo said archly. Then he asked, for he had been quite curious ever since they escaped from Mirkwood, "Balin taught you to read, you said?"

Kili nodded. "Thorin employed him to teach Fili, and so he was often in the house. When my chores were done, I would sometimes sneak into the back of the classroom and hide in the cupboard. Balin used to tell stories, you see, of great battles and wondrous deeds of the kings and warriors of old. He was a gifted storyteller, or so he seemed to me. If I was very quiet, Balin would pretend he didn't notice I was there."

What a lot of pretending there had been in that house, Bilbo thought, a little uncharitably.

"When he was teaching Fili to read," Kili said, "Balin would wait until I was there, and then he would write the letters extra large on the board, so I could see even from the back. And he would leave Fili's old books in the cupboard, and I would sneak in sometimes after my early morning chores were done and study them before anyone else was awake. I don't think I should ever have learned, if not for him. Many dwarves don't."

Bilbo thought of the crowded schoolroom of his youth, the brightly colored picture-books, and the class sounding out the names of all the flowers and trees that could be found in the Shire, and the animals, and the foods they loved most of all. And he thought too of his mother, sitting by his side, reading his favorite tales of elves and fairy-magic, giving him a kiss on the cheek or a pat on the head every time he learned a new word. And though he did not tear up, he could not help his throat growing tight; he swallowed hard against the sadness and forced a weak, wobbly smile. "That was nice of Balin."

Kili nodded. "He was kind. He made my life a little easier when he could. He believes _khazd khuv_ are to be pitied, not shunned."

"Then he does not believe you are cursed?"

"Well," Kili said, brow furrowed, "I am not sure I could go that far. Dwalin does not doubt it at all, and they are brothers. But Balin believes we are all of us cursed in some way, I think, and so he is more comfortable around me than his brother. Dwalin would not have me in their house when I was a child." Kili shrugged. "If you look, you will see he sits as far away from me as he can, without it being obvious."

"I don't know how you bear it," Bilbo said. "It seems so very lonely."

"Maybe to you," Kili said. "I never thought so. It was a very simple way to live. I knew who I was and what I was meant to do. And I had a warm, safe place to sleep, and clothing on my back, and enough food so I did not go hungry — there are others whose circumstances are far worse."

Well, Bilbo supposed that was true, though he did not know of anyone, for in the Shire everyone had family, and everyone was loved by someone, even if some were liked less well than others. But he knew too that not every place was a bountiful as the Shire, and not every race as caring and protective as hobbits. "You said it was a simple way to live. Do you feel differently now?"

Kili frowned. "Everything is much more complicated now. I am — less certain of my place. That is partially your fault, Mr. Baggins."

He said it without heat, but Bilbo still flinched a little, and blushed. "I am sure I did not mean to make your life complicated, Master Kili."

"Are you?" Kili asked, eying him keenly. "Are you really quite sure of that?"

Well, Bilbo certainly had no good answer for that, for if he was honest with himself, he had been resolved from the very first to pour sense as he saw it into Kili's head. But now he could not imagine what he had been thinking, to interfere in something that he ill-understood and had no stake in, but that he had perceived an injustice and set about rectifying it in a very naïve manner indeed.

They were sitting in front of the secret door, away from the others, who were quite sick of staring at the impervious stone and were milling about waiting for the miserable day come to a close. Bilbo's thoughts were quite gloomy indeed: his talk with Kili had left him deeply unsettled, and to make it worse, the sun was setting and it seemed they had failed in their quest at the very end, after such a long and arduous adventure as no hobbit had ever seen. Bilbo felt a proper failure from head to toe, in fact, and was regretting for the hundredth time his silly, impulsive decision to leave his warm and cozy home, when the very last rays of the setting sun fell upon the plain rock wall.

There was a loud crack. A flake of rock split from the wall and fell. A hole appeared suddenly about three feet from the ground.

"Kili," Bilbo cried, jumping to his feet. "Kili, look, do you see? Do you see?"

And Kili looked, and saw! He called quickly for Thorin, and Thorin and all the other dwarves came as fast as they could, for Kili's voice was loud and trembling and excited. The dwarves all exclaimed upon seeing the keyhole that it had been the very best of luck that Bilbo had been sitting right there, just at that moment — of course they did not say anything about Kili being there at the same time, but Bilbo had already decided that he would say no more on matters of _khazd khuv_, at least unless someone asked him directly.

Anyway, Bilbo was truly quite excited as the rest, and they all watched eagerly as Thorin stepped up and drew the key on its chain from around his neck. He put it to the hole. It fitted and it turned!

A great cry rose from the dwarves, and they gathered to push at the door, straining against it until it opened slowly. All that could be seen inside was blackness, and not a sound could be heard. Outside, the last rays of the setting sun disappeared behind the mountain, and they were surrounded now by darkness in front and darkness behind.

* * *

A/N:

I do apologize for the relative tardiness of this chapter. Work commitments got the better of me. Plus I had a feeling something was missing, which utimately proved to be the Fili and Bilbo conversation - which my tireless beta SapphireMusings has not seen, so I hope it doesn't have too many mistakes.

Thanks always for your comments! They brighten my day, truly.

Coming up next ... into the mountain (cue the ominous music).


	17. Smaug the Great and Terrible

Chapter summary: Just what the title says

* * *

So began some of the scariest and strangest days of Bilbo's life, for Bilbo suddenly remembered that he had come on this journey to burgle the hoarded treasure of a dragon! It was not that he had forgotten, exactly, but that the business of getting to the mountain had been so arduous that it had rather put the dragon mainly out of his mind. And perhaps there was a part of him that had never really believed there _was_ a dragon to be found, or if one such did exist, that it would be no more fearsome than the paper creatures every hobbit child owned. But here they were, in the great mountain itself, and Thorin took it on himself to remind Bilbo — at quite a length — that this was in fact precisely the reason for which he had come along, and they would all be most grateful if he would get on with it, please and thank you very much.

Well, Bilbo was more than a little cross at Thorin for his lofty manner, and also more than a little afraid of the great Smaug. But while it is fair to say that the Bilbo Baggins who set out from Bag-End nearly six months prior would have squeaked and quite possibly so much as fainted upon the realization that he was actually meant to confront a dragon (and would certainly not have taken a step inside the mountain, no matter what paper he had put his hand to), _this_ Bilbo Baggins had jousted with trolls and goblins and elves, and had won a riddle contest with a horrible little creature who lived all in shadow, and traveled with a dagger on his belt. And this very changed hobbit was determined to meet his obligations, and so he set off quite bravely into the cavern where lived the dragon Smaug, while the rest of the Company politely wished him well and stayed quite safely outside the mountain.

It was very fortunate indeed that the great dragon Smaug was asleep, or else Bilbo might never have made it back from that very terrifying trip. But asleep Smaug was, and quite soundly too, so he did nothing but huff and snore when Bilbo, having grown quite bold in those months of adventure, thieved a goblet and stole away with it back into the tunnel where dwarves awaited him. Easy it may sound to escape a slumbering beast, but it nonetheless took all of Bilbo's courage, for a sleeping dragon may still waken, and even the quietest of hobbits might make a noise when walking amidst mounds of slippery, noisy coins. But luck was with Bilbo and he escaped quite unburnt back to the tunnel where the dwarves awaited him.

The Company was delighted that Bilbo had retrieved this token, and they spent a happy little while passing it from hand to hand, exclaiming at its beauty, and waxing long and poetic about the remaining treasure they were about to reclaim. Bilbo they could not praise enough, and Bofur began right then and there to pen a new song in his honor.

Well, the dwarves were delighted, but Smaug was not, for upon awakening he could tell right away that a thief had taken a piece of his treasure. And he became enraged and flew out from his nest for the first time in many years, muttering and cursing under his great fiery breath. That night and all the next day were terrifying indeed, for though they managed to stay safely hidden from Smaug that night, they had now lost their one advantage, for Smaug was awake and knew they were there, and this calamity the ungrateful dwarves laid squarely at Bilbo's hairy feet.

This put Bilbo in a very foul temper indeed, and in the heat of the moment it is possible he let slip some language that would have had his mother boxing his ears, if she had heard it, but many months spent on the road with dwarves had lowered Bilbo's inhibitions to no small degree. "You ought to have brought five hundred burglars," he grumbled irritably later, "not one. I should want hundreds of years to bring it all up, if I was fifty times as big, and Smaug as tame as a rabbit."

He was sitting with Kili as far away from the others as he could, for he felt he could not stand even one more disapproving look from the dwarves, but Kili would certainly never look at him in such a manner. "You will forgive me for saying so, I hope," Bilbo said, when Kili did not comment on the appropriate number of burglars for toting away mountains of gold, "but it does not seem very wise to have come all this way without a single idea for how to dispose of the dragon waiting for you at the end of the road!" Secretly, Bilbo suspected that the dwarves had been hoping to arrive at Erebor and find the dragon already dead, with naught to do but stroll in and reclaim the mountain and treasure both. ("Not such a race of thinkers as hobbits, indeed!" Bilbo thought irritably, though he could not honestly admit to being very surprised, as it seemed in retrospect that this entire journey had been undertaken on nothing more than hopeful spirits.)

"I don't think," Kili said, "that they had ever really considered exactly what we should do when we got here." Bilbo knew that by "they," Kili meant "Thorin," but of course the young dwarf would never disparage his _shemor_ so directly. "But they will not give up now, when we are so close."

"So close to being fried dragon treat!" Bilbo muttered, quite sourly, and he spent the rest of the night muttering similarly irritable thoughts under his breath, until eventually he fell into an uneasy sleep and dreamt dreams in which the Company were tied up to be roasted over the trolls' cookfire, with Smaug himself companionably supplying the flames.

The next day, Bilbo crept down again to Smaug's lair in hopes of spotting some weakness, safe in the knowledge that he could not be seen whilst wearing his magic ring. But Smaug needed not to see him to know he was there and spoke to him directly. Perhaps it should have been strange to Bilbo to meet a dragon that spoke Common, but it was no less strange than finding a magic ring that granted invisibility or meeting a man who could be a bear when he wanted. And so Bilbo spoke to Smaug, and it was a very peculiar conversation indeed. Bilbo was twice as bold as he had ever been in his life, and told a great many fibs, and in the end nearly had all his hair burnt off by dragonfire, but he escaped safely and scuttled back to the dwarves as quickly as he could, his stout hobbit heart jumping with fear at what he had heard.

Meanwhile, Smaug was infuriated that he had not been able to burn the miserable little thief to cinders, and flew from his lair again, breathing fire and hissing angrily. This time he would not be satisfied with scorching the grass and shrubs around his mountain! This time, someone would pay for having dared to take what belong to the great Smaug!

"He thinks we are from Lake-Town!" Bilbo cried, trembling with fear. "For he knows the smell of dwarves, and knows that none live between Esgaroth and the Lonely Mountain! And he has smelt our ponies, and the packs of men are upon them! He is off to set upon them!"

There was much grumbling among the dwarves then, for it seemed that Bilbo was proposing that they somehow stop the dragon — which he was — and they still had not the slightest idea how to do that.

"We cannot stop a dragon from doing what dragons do," Thorin said gruffly.

"Oh, so says the great Thorin Oakenshield," Bilbo said, quite crossly. "You were happy enough to take help from the men of Lake-Town when you needed it. Shall you now let them burn to cinders? That is a fine payback indeed!"

Thorin frowned, for no dwarvish member of the Company would dare to speak to him thusly; in fact, he had not been spoken to in such a manner since his sister died, and their mother before her. But Bilbo had proved his worth many times over, and so Thorin forgave him the impertinence. "I would take any suggestion you have," he said politely, "as to how we might stop him."

"Of course, leave it all to me again!" Bilbo snapped. He was tired to death of dwarves in general, and Thorin in particular. This made him rather more Tookish than he would have been in any other circumstance, and he did not think before he next spoke. "Very well, I shall take care of it myself!" Then before anyone could stop him, he ran out of the tunnel and onto the mountain where he shouted at Smaug, as loudly as he could, "Ha! You great thundering lizard! If you go to Lake-Town, I shall stay here and burgle all your treasure away, see if I don't!"

Well, although Smaug was already a mile away, dragon hearing is better than the hearing of almost any other creature under the sun, and this got his attention for certain! So he made a huge, wide turn in the air, and changed his course back to his mountain, where he had every intention of finding the nasty thieving creature and burning him to cinders before he could lay a single grimy finger on even one more piece of gold.

The dwarves all stood in the mouth of the tunnel gaping at Bilbo. "Mr. Baggins," Fili said, quite carefully, as if Bilbo was perhaps just a bit insane, "is your plan that we should all be incinerated, and thus save the town with our deaths?"

"That is _a_ plan," Bilbo said, "but it is not _my_ plan! I have no wish to be incinerated, thank you very much! No indeed!" And then he told them what he had seen with his keen eyes during that very singular conversation amidst the piles of gold, that the great fire-drake had a bare patch upon his chest, where no scales lay at all, and where a skilled archer might shoot an arrow right into the dragon's heart.

At this, all eyes in the Company turned slowly to Kili, who paled and took a step backwards. "You cannot trust this to me," he said, eyes wide. "You know you cannot."

The Ur cousins nodded their heads in complete agreement, and Dwalin looked no more agreeable, but Bilbo was quite firm. "You are the best archer in the Company," he said, in a tone that brooked not an ounce of disagreement. "I have seen you hit a much smaller target with ease. And you have the bow that Regrin crafted, that came to you twice, and for what reason could that have been but that you should do something great and terrible with it?"

"But a shot like that," Kili said, "would require luck." He was quite horribly pale, for in his heart he really did believe that he was cursed and had naught but ill luck, and who could blame him, when no one had ever told him differently in all his life but for the very most recent months?

Bilbo was so angry, he stamped his foot. "None of that!" he said, quite forgetting his intention to desist from commenting on _khazd khuv _if not asked. "It will take skill, and that you have plenty of; if you take the shot and make it, then I say you will have proven you have both skill and luck! And if you take the shot and miss, then we shall all be cinders and ash, and none will be left to crow that he knew better."

Then they heard the flap of the dragon's wings, and there was no more time to argue. Fili grabbed Kili's pack and dug in it frantically, pulling out the bow. "Take the shot!" he said desperately. And Thorin stood beside him, and in his hands he held a quiver of arrows, and he nodded his agreement. "It is as Mr. Baggins said. You are the most skilled archer among us. Use the bow and save us all."

Kili swallowed and his hands trembled, but he could not refuse his _shemor_, and in another instant Smaug would be upon them and their lives forfeit. Kili took the bow and unfolded it as swiftly as he could and slung the quiver across his back, stepping hesitantly to the entrance of the cave. The dragon's roar of rage was loud and terrifying, and flames licked the ground outside, but Kili stood tall and steady, and when he nocked the arrow in the bow, his hands had stopped shaking; not the slightest tremor in them could be seen.

They all held their breath then, for Kili stood so still and silent, no one dared to make the slightest noise to disturb his concentration. And then the dragon came around again and exposed his great breast, and Kili's arrow flew strong and true and pierced the very spot where no scales grew, and sank in, arrowhead, shaft, feathers and all. Smaug shrieked and twisted and breathed hot flame that scoured the mountainside, but Kili was already safely back in the tunnel and was not burned.

Away Smaug flew, dying and desperate, but he could not escape the arrow in his breast that had been shot from the bow of Regrin, which was _Nashak Durin _and crafted in the days of old for that greatest of kings and his heirs. Whether there was magic or not in that bow, no one could say, but with hardly a whisper, Kili's arrow pierced Smaug's black heart and stopped its beating. Smaug fell to the ground halfway between the mountain and Lake-Town, and breathed no more.

Up on the mountain, the dwarves cheered and shouted and clapped Kili on the back, and Bilbo too, and for that day, at least, there was no talk of curses or bad luck or anything but the great victory they had scored over the dragon.

Now was a time for celebration indeed. The dwarves were merrier than even the merriest hobbits, and that was very merry indeed. They were filled with the kind of giddy joy that only arises when one has managed to pull off a feat that was impossible by any logical reckoning, and now were running through the tunnels laughing and shrieking in quite boyish abandon. "We did it, Mr. Baggins!" Fili said, pounding him so furiously on the back that Bilbo was sure he would be black and blue come morning. "Thanks to you, we have done it!"

Bilbo rather thought that _he_ had done it, and Kili too, for most of the rest of the dwarves had not in his estimation done very much at all except trudge along and get taken prisoner occasionally. But of course he kept that to himself, for they were a good Company and good company besides, and he did not begrudge them their enthusiasm now that the home that was for so long lost to them was reclaimed.

Thorin drew near to where Bilbo was walking with Kili by his side. The young dwarf had not said a word since he had slain the dragon, but held on tight to the wondrous bow. Every once in a while, he would stop in his paces and shake his head rather violently as if waking himself from a dream, and more than once Bilbo saw his lips move, though he uttered no words that Bilbo could hear.

"Kili," Thorin said, clapping him gently on the shoulder. "Well done. Very well done."

Kili nodded distractedly. "Thank you, _shemor_."

Thorin frowned and seemed on the verge of correcting him, but did not. Instead he kept pace with the two of them for a few moments, eyes focused on the dwarves who ran up ahead but seeming to see something else entirely. "She would have been proud," he finally said, very quietly, then gave Kili another small pat on the shoulder before jogging away to catch up to the rest.

Kili stopped in his tracks and stood stock still, blinking hard. Bilbo thought of saying something, but could not think of anything to say that seemed the least appropriate to the circumstance, especially when he was not certain exactly what the circumstance was, only that it seemed very significant. He was saved from his dilemma, for just then the dwarves' exultant shouts rose to a new volume and took on a new character; such a hue and cry Bilbo had never heard! They had entered the great cavern of the dragon!

* * *

Bard? Bard who?

Believe it or not, I did not write the bow of Regrin into the story for the sole purpose of having Kili shoot Smaug with it. I just wanted to give him something special of his own. But then, well, it seemed that if Kili had the bow, he kind of _had_ to use it to kill Smaug.

Anyway, into the mountain we go! Onward!

Thanks as always to my beta SapphireMusings and my DH for reading; thanks too to all who take the time to drop me an encouraging comment! And apologies if I owe you a comment in reply. I am behind, I know, but I thought I'd better post this and get to replying later, rather than the other way around.


	18. Within the Mountain

Chapter summary:

Wherein we take two steps forward and one step back.

Warning for a little unpleasantness, but nothing graphic.

* * *

Bilbo wandered through the great hall in a daze as the excited dwarves ran about, shouting to each other about the gold and jewels and other magnificent treasures beneath their feet. Now that Smaug was dead, Bilbo was able to view the vast hoard of treasure with wide eyes, and it was quite beyond his wildest dreams. A thirteenth share of it was his, and yet even a fraction of that amount would be more gold than all the Shire could ever use in a dozen lifetimes. How he should get it home, he had no idea, and what he should do with it when he got it there, he could not begin to imagine. As has been noted, he was quite a well-to-do hobbit and he had never wanted for anything at all; he had not come on this adventure for the gold he might receive at the end of it, but for what he might learn and see along the way.

In front of him was a great mound of treasure — one of many such mounds in the room and made entirely of jewels. Bilbo took it in his head to climb it like a mountain and survey the room from the top. Carefully he picked his way up; it was not easy, for the jewels and gems beneath his feet shifted with every step he took, but Bilbo was a hobbit, and hobbit feet are tough and good at gripping stones and twigs and also, it turned out, jewels and gems. Slowly, slowly, he climbed to the top, while the dwarves scurried about below still shouting to each other in their great excitement.

At the top, he stopped and stooped down, drawn to something at his feet. He was quite so high up the mound of treasure that the dwarves could not have seen what drew his interest even had they been looking. But they were not looking at him at all, for they were too excited by all the treasure to pay any attention to their burglar. This was unfortunate, as it might well have saved a lot of bother and heartache later had they realized that Bilbo had just stumbled across the Arkenstone! For indeed, as he climbed, a pale white light shone before him, and as he came near, he saw it was tinged with a flickering sparkle of many colors shimmering at the surface. At last he looked down upon it, and he caught his breath, for the great jewel shown before his feet of its own inner light, like ten thousand sparks of white radiance shot with glints of the rainbow.

He knew at once it was the Arkenstone, for surely there could not be two such gems, even in so marvelous a hoard, even in all the world. And though this was the jewel Thorin sought most out of all the gold and gems and treasure, still Bilbo's arm went towards it quite outside of his own volition, drawn by its enchantment, and he lifted it up and put in his deepest pocket. "Now I am a burglar indeed," thought he. "But I suppose I must tell the dwarves about it — some time." But he did not think that time was just yet; if he had been less bewitched, he might have grown suspicious of himself, for his desire to keep the gem hidden was akin to his desire to keep secret the marvelous ring he had stolen in the caverns beneath Goblin-Town, and that he knew was magic. But objects of power have their own minds and can cloud the thoughts of even the gentlest, most honest folk. So bespelled was he that by the time he had climbed back down the mountain of treasure to the floor where the dwarves still ran about, Bilbo had nearly forgotten about the jewel that was tucked away in his coat, and every time his thoughts strayed to it, another thought would quickly come to take its place.

"It is incredible, is it not?" Kili said, picking his way carefully through the piles of gold coins scattered about. There would be no sneaking up on anyone until the treasure was dealt with, for it lay glittering all across the floor like confetti, and there was no way to walk without kicking some to the left or right. "It is even more beautiful than Balin's tales made it seem." Yet he alone among the dwarves had not picked up a single coin, nor touched a single golden cup or harp, nor reached for even one jewel-encrusted weapon or piece of mail.

"That it is," Bilbo agreed, "though I confess right now I would trade much of it away for a good hot bath and a cup of tea, with perhaps a biscuit or two and some jam." They had been eating well enough since they left Lake-Town, but much of what they had been eating was _cram_, and though it was hearty and filling, it had not much taste.

Kili gifted him with one of his rare, small smiles. "You hobbits are a very practical sort of people," he said. "Gold is all well and good when it can be traded for something useful, but otherwise it has little to recommend it but its beauty. I would not mind a bath myself." And indeed, he was quite filthy, and his fine traveling clothes were stained and scorched, for even Elvish leather could not withstand the lick of dragon fire.

"I suppose we shall be able to attend to such things when they have gotten over the thrill of taking account of their treasure."

Kili raised an eyebrow. "If you think they shall ever get over it, you have learned very little of dwarves in all this time."

"But you do not seem particularly impressed," Bilbo said, "not even by the weapons."

"I find a well-carved bow to be more practical than one studded with gems," Kili said with a shrug, and indeed, his marvelous bow was slung securely across his back, and Bilbo did not imagine Kili would ever find another to be its equal, no matter how bejeweled. "In any event, none of this accrues to me. If the armory is intact, perhaps I shall ask Thorin for a sword. I have only ever been permitted a dagger. But he would consider it now, I think."

"I should certainly hope so," Bilbo said. "You are a dragon-slayer! They shall record your name in the history books."

Kili's eyes darkened. "I do not think so, Mr. Baggins. Nothing has changed."

"Oh, I think you shall find that they have," Bilbo said, and he smiled so brightly Kili could do nothing but smile shyly back.

Over the course of the coming days it was clear that things _had _changed, and if not enough for Bilbo's liking, it was still better than it had been, for Ori and his brothers were now Kili's great friends, any reservations they might ever have held about him seemingly entirely forgotten, and not the slightest chill in their manner towards him. So when the time came for meals, the brothers Ri would wait until Kili was served and happily sit with him, chatting of this and that, and begging him again to tell the story of how he shot the dragon. This Kili did with some reluctance, for he was still very uncomfortable conversing with dwarves other than Thorin and Fili, but Ori in particular would not suffer anything but a detailed, embellished recitation, and Kili soon learned that the only way to satisfy him was to tell it.

And Fili! Bilbo was quite pleased with him, indeed. In the beginning of their quest, Bilbo had harbored some rather disapproving thoughts about Fili, thinking him immature and selfish. Later, he had realized that Fili was not particularly immature but simply still young by dwarvish standards, and he was certainly not selfish; Bilbo's negative opinion of him had been largely based on his own distaste for the laws of _khazd khuv_. But Bilbo now came to see that it had hardly been fair to expect Fili to somehow see the truth (or at least the truth as Bilbo saw it) of everything he had been raised to believe; why, Kili himself had seen nothing wrong about it!

Fili was now very warm and friendly to Kili, and he was very complimentary of Kili's skill with a bow. But best of all to Bilbo's mind at least was that when Thorin granted Kili a sword from the armory, Fili made sure to practice sparring with him. He was a patient and careful instructor. "I'm much nicer than Dwalin," he said with a grin, as he knocked Kili to the ground again. "At least you shall have no bruises."

Bilbo wished Fili hadn't mentioned Dwalin, for the older dwarf was still quite uncomfortable around Kili, but Kili himself did not seem to mind; he simply pulled himself up from the ground and brushed the dust off and raised his sword again, as patient and willing a student as Fili was a teacher.

"No," Fili said, looking at him with no little exasperation. "Right hand above the left; do you want to slice your own foot off?"

"You would like that," Kili said, "since it might give you a fair chance to beat me in a race."

"Ha," Fili said. "That was just the once." But then his eyes narrowed and his face dipped into a frown. "No, I do not believe that every time you lost to me in a contest was false."

"Not _every _time," Kili said, and quite devilishly too, in Bilbo's opinion.

Fili scowled but could not hold it for long; he broke into laughter and raised his sword. "You are getting quite bold, Dragon Slayer," he said, "but you shall not be so insolent when you are lying in the dust at my feet!" He attacked again with wild enthusiasm, and Kili met his attack with equal zeal, the sound of steel meeting steel ringing loudly in the morning air.

Bilbo wandered away quite content, for though he had no hopes that Fili would suddenly embrace Kili as his brother — or at least, such hopes as he had he kept well hidden — he nonetheless thought that any softening at all on Fili's part could only be good for Kili, for of all the dwarves Fili was the one who spent the most time with Kili, outside of Thorin, and Fili was the future king of Erebor besides.

Not all was perfect in the mountain, of course. Bilbo had overheard Bofur whispering to Bombur that surely disaster was going to strike soon to pay for the good fortune Kili had in bringing down Smaug with but a single arrow, and the Ur cousins still kept a careful distance most times. And Thorin spent his days searching with increasing desperation for the Arkenstone, but of course he could not find it, for it was tucked away in Bilbo's pillow, and certainly none would think to look there. Soon Thorin had not a kind word to say to anyone, not even Fili; Bilbo stayed well out of his way for as many hours of the day as he could, for he was always afraid that Thorin might read his expression and guess he had the jewel himself.

On top of all that, of course they were still stuck in the mountain, and though there was water aplenty there was nothing to eat but what they had brought with them, and mostly what remained of those stores was _cram_. Under better circumstances, perhaps they would have sent someone back to Lake-Town to gather more supplies, but they had received word by raven that the Master had convinced the men of the town that they were owed a share of the spoils for having helped the dwarves in their hour of need, and now they were approaching with a large force. An allied force of Silvan elves approached as well, for Mirkwood and Lake-Town had been trading partners for many years and Thranduil too wanted a share of the mountain's treasure.

Privately, Bilbo thought the men and even Thranduil might have a legitimate claim to some of the treasure that still littered the floors within the mountain, for surely not all of Smaug's great fortune had come from the dwarves. But there was no telling that to Thorin! Infuriatingly, most of the rest of the dwarves seemed to be in agreement too, although Bombur cared more for food than treasure and Fili was mostly indifferent to it, but for the many knives and swords he had collected, each finer and sharper than the last.

The dwarves had sent a raven to Thorin's cousin Dáin, the lord of the Iron Hills, but whether Dáin would arrive before the men and elves was yet to be seen. In the meantime, the dwarves occupied themselves fortifying the mountain from enemy attack; all but Thorin, who spent his days searching with increasing desperation for the Arkenstone.

Each night saw them all a little grumpier and dirtier and smellier; Bilbo's dreams now alternated between warm baths and full meals — even on one memorable occasion, both at the same time! Thorin was the grumpiest of them all. To Bilbo, he was becoming quite irrational in his quest. "It is but a single jewel," he said one day to Fili and Kili, as they labored strengthening the main gates.

Fili straightened, hands pressing to the small of his back with a grimace. "It is the most important jewel to Thorin," he said, "and he is our king."

Kili was silent, and his face gave away nothing, but he let drop the boulder he was hefting with uncharacteristic force; it landed heavily against the stone wall, shaking loose pebbles and dirt. Fili shot him a sharp glance, his own expression less perfectly composed and discomfited. "I'm sure we shall find it soon enough," he said, "with so many hours of the day spent in the looking."

Kili looked away, frowning, and Bilbo felt quite guilty, for he of course could have ended the hunt any time he chose, and in fact many times he had come close to handing over the jewel. But some strange force compelled him to keep it hidden; every time he reached to remove it from his pillow, a little voice in his head cried out that he should keep it, and he would find he had stepped away from his bed entirely, the Arkenstone still hidden away. He did not often think how peculiar this behavior was on his part, but when he did, he remembered the stories Ori had told him of how the Arkenstone had driven Thrór mad, and Bilbo decided that he was in no rush to see the same fate befall Thorin, and that is why he kept the stone for himself.

By the time they had been in the Mountain for nearly a fortnight, the strain was wearing on all of them; Bilbo was hard-pressed to recall the happiness of those first few moments after Smaug was slain. The dwarves were all drawn and weary, their eyes hard and cold, but none so hard and cold as Thorin's. Even Fili's perpetual optimism seemed dimmed, and when he sparred with Kili he fought hard and without mercy.

"Perhaps you could be a little gentler with him," Bilbo suggested, very tentatively, after one particularly difficult session had left Kili nursing an ugly bruise on his jaw and a gash in his arm. "He has not had the same training as you." Nor would Kili ever dare strike a blow with any real force against Fili, Bilbo thought, which put Fili at a very unfair advantage, and Bilbo was rather distressed that Fili didn't seem to realize it.

"An enemy will not be gentle with him," Fili said harshly, and he stalked away without another word, still clutching his sword. "He will need to be better prepared for battle, if he is to survive."

Oh, how Bilbo wished they had never come to the mountain at all! For all the good cheer they had was lost, and now Bilbo's hope was nearly lost too, and he could not see what to do about it.

In due course the armies of Lake-Town and Mirkwood arrived, and they were large and well-armed, and Bilbo grew increasingly fearful of war, which he had never seen nor had any wish to ever see in his lifetime! But Thorin was no more of a mind than ever to negotiate with the men and elves and would admit to no legitimacy in their claims; he refused to surrender even a single piece of gold under threat of force, and no words of counsel would sway him from this course.

Bilbo's sleep that night was poor and restless, and the next morning he could not drag himself up from his bedroll until the sun was nearly at its highest point in the sky. He washed and ate a very unsatisfying meal of _cram_, then stumbled wearily out to the main chamber, where the dwarves would often gather in the morning to sift through the still massive piles of the dragon's hoard, sorting the gold from the silver and the coins from the jewelry from the weaponry. It was dull and tedious work, and they were all tired of it, though Bilbo was the most tired of it at all, for he knew they would not find what they sought no matter how long they looked, and he had not the dwarves' deep interest in the treasure.

Several of the dwarves were already there, though they did not appear to be working but for Fili, who was sorting coins with grim determination. "Good morning," Bilbo said, though there was nothing particularly good about it and it was hardly still morning. When he received no reply, not even a grunt or a nod, he repeated it more loudly, "Good morning!" For the niceties must be observed, no matter how foul the mood.

Fili looked up at that and nodded, but his eyes were hard, and he returned to sorting with angry vigor, tossing the coins and jewels away as if they were pebbles, not the most precious of metals and gems.

Bilbo frowned. The atmosphere in the room was dark and heavy. Bofur and Bombur sat far across the room, heads bent together, and they were speaking in low, urgent whispers. All three Ri brothers were there as well; Ori looked distraught, and Dori and Nori looked not very much happier.

"What is it?" Bilbo asked. "What has happened?"

No one answered, but the set to Fili's mouth grew tighter.

Bilbo grew increasingly apprehensive that something terrible had befallen them while he slept. "What is it? Something is wrong, and it will not get any better by being kept secret."

"It is Thorin," Ori finally said. "He still cannot find the Arkenstone."

Bilbo barely refrained from groaning. "It is probably gone for good," he said crossly. "Perhaps Smaug ate it. There are a thousand other stones here for Thorin. If he would settle for one of those, we should all be much happier."

"He will never settle for another," Ori said. "And early this morning he concluded that it was bad luck keeping him from finding it."

"And so it may be," Bilbo said. "Though there are mountains of gold here yet to be searched, so perhaps time is all it will take."

"No," Ori said. "Mr. Baggins, Thorin now believes it is _bad luck_ that he cannot find the Arkenstone."

Bilbo felt suddenly very queasy. He looked around the room again. There were Oín and Gloín and Bifur, huddled in a circle, Oín looking especially somber and grim, and clutching uneasily at the bag wherein he kept his medical supplies; and there was Dwalin, leaning against a wall, arms crossed, looking uncomfortable yet fierce and foreboding; Balin was sitting on the ground next to him, head back against the wall and his eyes closed. And that just left–

"Where is Kili?" Bilbo's voice sounded very small and quiet to his own ears.

Fili threw some coins across the room. They scattered and ricocheted like fireworks. "He is with Thorin."

Bilbo swallowed hard, a bitter taste filling his mouth. "Thorin is not — he would not — "

"Kili is _khazd khuv_," Fili said darkly. "He bears the blame for bad luck."

Ori cursed. _Ori_. Then he said, quite distressed, "It's just a stupid old superstition! You're not meant to take it seriously!"

Bilbo agreed with this sentiment wholeheartedly, though he was rather surprised to hear Ori say it out loud. The other dwarves shifted uneasily, and Nori pulled at the hem of Ori's coat, glancing nervously at Dwalin and Balin.

"He can't," Biblo said, feeling sick and numb. "He _mustn't_. We cannot permit it. None of this is Kili's fault!"

Fili answered, voice thick and dull, "Thorin is Kili's _shemor._ To mete out punishment is his right, and his responsibility." But then he thrust his arms through the pile of treasure in front of him, sweeping it away like a sandcastle, and he cursed more fluently and quite a bit more foully than Ori had. He was so very angry, Bilbo shrank back a bit from his fury. "It is but a single stone. We could look here for years and never find it. Failure to find one jewel in all of this is not bad luck. It is just _failure._" He sighed then, and dropped to his knees in the gold, head bowed. "Before now, Thorin has always known the difference."

At that moment, Thorin stalked into the room from a small hallway, close to where Dwalin had been perched — standing guard, Bilbo realized suddenly, in case any of the dwarves had taken it into their heads to interfere with whatever punishment Thorin had seen fit to administer. "Oín," he said curtly. "He requires some assistance."

Oín had already darted into the hallway, bag in hand, with Ori close on his heels. Fili rose to his feet and looked as if he were going to follow them, but Thorin summoned him with a brusque, "Fili. Attend me."

Fili actually hesitated, glancing towards the hallway, but Thorin growled, "_Fili,"_ and Fili had no choice but to follow, though his eyes were dark and shadowed, and his expression stormy.

Bilbo waited but a moment before he too entered the small hallway, feeling sick with horror and guilt, for he had been keeping the Arkenstone to himself for all this time; and he had seen Thorin's slow, steady descent into madness, yet it had never occurred to him to worry about the scapegoat on whom Thorin's rage would most likely fall. And that too of course was strange, when so often he worried so deeply about so many things, and yet for all this time he had not worried about the potentially disastrous and very likely outcome of his stubborn and most uncharacteristic deceit. It was with a heavy heart and a peculiar sense of unease that he approached the room at the end of the hall, the Arkenstone weighing on his mind all the while.

The chamber was small and dim, lit only with a single torch. Kili was sitting on the floor; and though he sat huddled in on himself, pale and wan, bare to the waist with his knees drawn up to chest, still all his limbs were intact and he was conscious and talking to Oín. Bilbo drew in a great breath then, feeling a deep relief, for he had feared how far Thorin's madness might have pushed him, and in what condition they might find the young dwarf.

Oín was peering at Kili's jaw, poking at his cheek none too gently, and he straightened up with a grunt. "Not broken, Mahal be praised," he said gruffly. "Though you'll sport a nasty bruise for a few days." He rustled in his bag and pulled out some sort of leaf. "Chew on this if you can, laddie. It will help with the pain."

Kili nodded and wiped his hands across his face roughly, smearing away dirt and blood and tears, before taking the leaf. But his jaw was bruised and swollen; he shook his head and winced, and worried the leaf between his fingers but did not put it in his mouth.

Ori piped up from he stood off to the side, picking nervously at his sleeve. "I'll make some feverfew tea. I'm sure we have some of that left. That will help, and there will be no need for Kili to chew anything." He darted back out of the hallway, calling for Dori and Bofur, as Oín turned his attention to Kili's back.

"And you, Mr. Baggins," Kili called out, in a voice thick and clogged. "What shall you do?"

"Well, anything I can do to help, of course," said Bilbo.

"Perhaps," Kili said, "you might share some of your cake with me."

Bilbo blinked, brow creased. "I would, of course, had we any left."

"Or you might call me _Master Dwarf_," Kili said, "as if I had any right to such a title. Or perhaps you will spend your nights talking to me of _change_."

Bilbo took a step back, for Kili's voice was suddenly cold and brittle, and the anger within it could not be misread. "I am sorry," he said quietly, "if anything I have done or said has caused you distress." This was quite possibly the most ludicrous statement he could have made under the circumstances, with Oín fussing and clucking over wounds on Kili's back that Bilbo couldn't see but knew were there, and the blame squarely at Bilbo's feet even if no one knew but he himself, but it was too late now, for the words were said and there was no taking them back.

"Please do not concern yourself with my feelings, Mr. Baggins," Kili said icily. Then he hissed as Oín poked at a sensitive spot on his back.

Oín tutted at him and pulled some salve out of his bag. "I don't think any of them will scar, but you'll be uncomfortable for a bit as they heal."

"Good," Kili muttered. He shifted restlessly under Oín's probing fingers. "Do you think it was enough?"

Oín sighed. "I've told you before not to ask me that, laddie. I've no mind for magics."

"But don't you think it has to be?" Kili asked. "He's never — this _has_ to be enough, doesn't it?" He hissed again.

"Easy," Oín said. "I'm just about done." Ori came back into the hall then, and he held an incongruously delicate teacup gently in his hands, steam furling gently towards the ceiling. "Ah," Oín said, "did you find feverfew root then?"

"Yes, plenty," Ori said. "Dori has nearly a full pouch."

"Good." Oín nodded, and Ori handed the cup to Kili. "Drink up, laddie, as much as you can stomach. And then chew the _yuko_ leaf, if your jaw will tolerate it."

Kili sipped at the tea and made a face. "Thank you, Mr. Oín. Mister Ori." It was then that he looked across the room and saw that Bilbo was still there. It seemed it was not a happy realization, for he frowned quite fiercely. His face was still smeared and filthy, and his hair was loose and wild around his face; truthfully, Bilbo thought he looked a bit feral. Bilbo took a step back, quite outside of his own volition, for the way Kili was glaring at him was frightening indeed.

"Perhaps," Kili said, in words that were tightly clipped and unbearably precise, "since you are such an expert burglar, Mr. Baggins, you might go and help my uncle find what it is he seeks. I am in very good hands here. You need not trouble yourself to stay."

Ori looked at Bilbo, and he looked very deeply uncomfortable, but he did not move from Kili's side, nor did he come to Bilbo's defense. And Oín too looked uneasy as he bustled about, rummaging in his medical bag and muttering rather loudly about herbs and salves and bandages, and he would not look at Bilbo. Bilbo himself had nothing to say that would not make matters worse, and so he just bowed, very awkwardly, and scuttled from the room as quickly as he could.

* * *

I'm sorry! I'm sorry! It had to happen, but honestly, I don't like it any more than you do. Things will get better eventually, I promise.

I'm also sorry it's been two weeks since an update. I honestly thought it had been a week, which just shows you how crazy my life and work have been.

This chapter has been giving me fits since I wrote the first draft. That dratted Arkenstone has been a thorn in my side from the beginning. I blame it all on Tolkien. So thank you to all who take the time to drop me a little note of encouragement. When I'm struggling it is a huge help!

And extra thanks to sapphiremusings for helping me figure out where to end this one.


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